Mulla Nasraldin decided to cover the floor of his courtyard with beautiful tiles. He pulled out the wild dandelions overgrowing everywhere in the yard, levelled the ground, pounded it hard solid and then laid his chosen tiles. But it would be only a matter of a few weeks before dandelions will start sprouting out from underneath the floor and cracking his beautifully laid tiles in several places. Day by day more cracks will just keep appearing. Mulla sought advice from neighbours and masons and tried every method to get rid of the wild dandelions but to no avails. Finally he went to the royal mason who was famous for his expertise in building and laying tiles. The wise old man had counselled many masons before and suggested a variety of remedies to expel the dandelions. Mulla tried them all but failed. He went again to the royal mason. They sat together in silence for some time and finally the wise man looked at Nasraldin and said, "Well Mulla, there is just one cure left." "And what is that?" Mulla inquired hopefully. "Just start loving them" replied the royal mason.
To no avail we try to smother our thoughts because we believe that if they would just stop and disappear we would be happy. We forget that they are like everything else; their appearance or disappearance has nothing to do with true happiness. If it did, true happiness would be conditional.
The dandelions are fine as long as there is no floor to crack.
Thoughts are fine as long as it is seen clearly that there is no thinker or ego to own them and be affected by them.
(The story was inspired to this Mulla by another traditional story of Mulla Nasrudin.The painting is by Ken Foster at http://kfostersketch.blogspot.com)
Yay!!!! What a relief Dude.
ReplyDeleteHello friend..
ReplyDeleteEverything is fine really if not rejected which doesn't mean not allowing life to deal with it; why, this would mean rejecting life's response wouldn't it?
When there is no friction, motion does not need an external force to sustain it.