A man, a great man, a fighter for freedom was traveling in the mountains. He stayed in a caravanserai for the night. He was amazed that in the caravanserai there was a beautiful parrot in a golden cage, continually repeating, “Freedom! Freedom!” And it was such a place that when the parrot repeated the word “Freedom!” it would go on echoing in the valleys, in the mountains. No animal feels the anguish; all animals are utterly satisfied as they are. Man is the only animal who is intrinsically discontented; hence, the feeling of shame because he knows, “I can be free.”
A king was coming out of his palace for his morning walk when he met a beggar. He asked the beggar,
“What do you want?”
The beggar laughed and said,
“You are asking me as though you can fulfill my desire!”
The king was offended. He said,
“Of course I can fulfill your desire. What is it? Just tell me.”
And the beggar said, “ Okay if you insist but on one condition..so think twice before you promise anything.”
The emperor had seen many beggars – but beggars with conditions?
And this beggar was really strange, a very powerful man. He was a Sufi Mystic. He had charm, a charisma, his personality had an aura. Even the king felt a little jealous. And conditions?
The emperor said, ” What do you mean ? What is your condition?”
The beggar said, “It is a very simple one. You see this begging bowl?
I accept only if you can fill my begging bowl absolutely.”
It was a small begging bowl. The king said, “Of course. What do you think I am? I cannot fill this dirty small begging bowl ?”
The beggar said, “It is better to tell you before, because later you can get into trouble. If you think you can fill, then come start filling.”
The king called his vizier and told him to fill to fill it with precious stones, with diamonds, rubies and emralds. Let this beggar know with whom he is talking. But then comes the difficulty. The bowl was filled, but the king was surprised- as the stones fell into it, it would disappear. It was filled many times and each time it was again empty.
Now he was in a great rage, but told the vizier, “Even if the whole kingdom goes, if my all treasuries are emptied, let them be- but I cannot allow this beggar to defeat me.”
And all the treasures, it is said, disappeared. By and by the king became a beggar. It took months. And the beggar was there, king was there and the whole capital was there and everybody was wondering what was going to happen, what would happen in the end.
Everything was simply disappearing. Finally the king had to fall at the feet of the beggar and he said, ” Forgive me, but before you leave just tell me one thing. What is the secret of this begging bowl? All has disappeared in it “
The beggar started laughing. He said, “It is made of human ego, everything disappears in it, nothing ever fulfils it.”
Have you ever seen a pigeon’s nest? Broken, messy and sometimes it’s not even there, have you wondered why it is so?
There was a time when pigeons used to lay eggs in the bushes; fox would come and eat the eggs. When pigeons couldn’t find a way to guard the eggs they went to the sparrows for help.
Sparrows said, ‘There is no other option but to build a nest on the tree.’
Pigeons made a nest, but it wasn’t done properly. Finally, they decided to take help from the sparrows to build the nest.
The birds were happy to teach the pigeons to make a good nest. When they had just begun to build the nest, pigeons said.. ‘Even we know how to build it like this, we will make it on our own.’
Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness doing well with money isn’t necessarily about what you know. It’s about how you behave. And behavior is hard to teach, even to really smart people. How to manage money, invest it, and make business decisions are typically considered to involve a lot of mathematical calculations, where data and formulae tell us exactly what to do. But in the real world, people don’t make financial decisions on a spreadsheet. They make them at the dinner table, or in a meeting room, where personal history, your unique view of the world, ego, pride, marketing, and odd incentives are scrambled together. In the psychology of money, the author shares 19 short stories exploring the strange ways people think about money and teaches you how to make better sense of one of life’s most important matters
Notes to Myself is one of MOPA’s flagship projects – a series of interactive, expository documentaries that deconstructs the lives and creative processes of some of the most impactful professionals associated with South India’s performing arts. Done in a let-your-hair-down and from-the-heart way, these offer an honest, moving and at times funny and charmingly unguarded look at the lives of these artistes.
This is the voice of Bombay Jayashri, a singer who has performed widely and successfully across genres – Carnatic music, Indian film playback singing, semi-classical music, fusion and more.
“The day my mother died I wrote in my journal, “A serious misfortune of my life has arrived.” I suffered for more than one year after the passing away of my mother. But one night, in the highlands of Vietnam, I was sleeping in the hut in my hermitage. I dreamed of my mother. I saw myself sitting with her, and we were having a wonderful talk. She looked young and beautiful, her hair flowing down. It was so pleasant to sit there and talk to her as if she had never died. When I woke up it was about two in the morning, and I felt very strongly that I had never lost my mother. The impression that my mother was still with me was very clear. I understood then that the idea of having lost my mother was just an idea. It was obvious in that moment that my mother is always alive in me.
Well ! No one has ever bothered to ask the Hare his side of the story, so let me tell you the story from a different point of view…
I met the Hare and sat down with him for a heart to heart talk.This is what he had to say after we spent the better part of a balmy summer afternoon getting to know one other.It was a wonderful experience, believe me..
“Yes, I am the hare who lost.No, I did not get lazy or complacent.Let me explain.I was hopping over the meadows near the hills and looked back to realize that the tortoise was nowhere to be seen.Assured of my healthy lead, I decided to take a short nap under the large banyan tree near the pond.The anticipation of the race had kept me up all night.For days, that old silly tortoise had boasted about his ability to plod for hundreds of miles without stopping.Life is a marathon, he said, not a sprint.I wanted to show him that I could run both far and fast.
The shade of the tree was like an umbrella.I found an almost oval rock, covered it with grass, and turned it into a makeshift pillow.I could hear the leaves rustling and the bees buzzing – it felt they were collaborating and even conspiring to put me to sleep.And it didn’t take them long to succeed.I saw myself drifting on a log in a beautiful stream of water.
When Valmiki completed his Ramayana, Narada wasn’t impressed. ‘It is good, but Hanuman’s is better,’ he said.
‘Hanuman has written the Ramayana too?!’ Valmiki didn’t like this at all and wondered whose Ramayana was better. So he set out to find Hanuman.
At Kadali-Vana, grove of plantains, he found Ramayana inscribed on seven broad leaves of a banana tree. He read it and found it to be perfect. The most exquisite choice of grammar and vocabulary, precise and melodious. He couldn’t help himself and started to cry.
‘Is it so bad?’ asked Hanuman ‘No, it is so good’, said Valmiki.
‘Then why are you crying?’ asked Hanuman. ‘Because after reading your Ramayana, no one will read mine,’ replied Valmiki.
Hearing this Hanuman simply tore up the seven banana leaves stating, ‘Now no one will ever read Hanuman’s Ramayana.’
ONE TUSK 