Story telling as an art is as old as the human civilization itself; through cave paintings, our mythological books and of course through recitation. Each generation has used it as a medium to share their life learnings and experiences. We as an individual cannot possibly experience everything ourself to incorporate the lessons accompanied, hence the importance for making sure we extract the knowledge we can from stories.
One such story book which was full of thought-provoking anecdotes I read as a kid was "Aesop's Fable". It had a story I would like to share from it covers an aspect of human emotion which deserves a space in our life but fading somewhere i.e., gentleness.
"The North Wind and the Sun"
One fine day, the North Wind and Sun had an argument on who was stronger among them. As they disputed, they saw a traveler passing by wearing a cloak. They reached an agreement that whoever could strip the traveler of its cloak was the stronger. The wind sent out a cold gust to blow off the cloak but the traveler wrapped the cloak around him. The harder the wind tried to blow off the coat, the tighter he held onto it and in the end the wind gave up. Now it was the sun's turn, and it began to radiate warm and pleasant heat to the traveler which was soothing after the bitter cold from the wind. As it slowly heated up; the traveler removed his cloak and went under the shade of a tree to save himself from the blazing heat.
In the book, this story has the lesson "Gentleness and kind persuasion win where force and bluster fail." The power of positive persuasion is more than that for forced argument. And this is something we must always remember; may it be personal or professional space. But for me as there is another lesson hidden inside it which is "Observe the situation, Analyze the root cause and then choose your action." The cloak was meant to shield the traveler from the cold, blowing the winds no matter how hard would not have brought out a positive outcome; whereas the warmth of the sun made the cloak unbearable to the traveler because it created a situation which absolved the purpose of the cloak. It's like the common saying goes,
"You don't use a sword where a needle is needed."
Very well said. A different prediction from this story. Keep growing each moment.
ReplyDeleteThe second learning is unique and exactly what we need in life. There cannot be one single answer to every problem. It's important to analyze first.
ReplyDeleteGood one, truly. Very practical advice surely growing out of experience.
ReplyDeleteThat's an interesting point of view..Keep up.
ReplyDelete