Letting Go of Our Stories.

“There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.” ― Mahatma Gandhi 

There is a Buddhist story, I very much love...about an older woman, left destitute with her two starving children.

She had no shelter from the driving rains, and no comforts to bring her family the 'warmth' they so very much deserved.

Each day, she cried out for the simple scraps left to be thrown away, "Please...please help me to feed my beautiful children. They are dying...please, won't anyone help us?"

And each night, she returned to that same sad story ~ of two children dying, with not even a morsel to comfort them.

And with each new moon, she begged...and pleaded...that someone, please, might come to save them.

And then, one day, a Monk approached her, seeing such sadness in her eyes. He knelt before this impoverished woman, taking her hand, and promising ~ that she and her family would never again want for anything. That they should always be well-cared for, and loved each day, unconditionally ~ enjoying, as equals, a most bountiful 'harvest.'

And, this Monk was so very taken by her status ~ that he promised, even upon his death, that her care would be continued with great loving-kindness, by those Monks who would carry on in his place.

But, there was just this one condition..

You see, the Monk asked this woman just one simple thing... that before each meal, each bite of food...that she might pause to reflect, and just long enough to say,

"I really don't need this, after all."

Only then, would she and her most beautiful children finally realize the true miracle of these most gracious gifts.

Sadly, though?

This woman, and in spite of her greatest needs, just couldn't bring herself to do just this... to say these few simple words, "I really don't need this, after all."

You see, she had become far too attached to her own story of poverty ~ that she simply couldn't see things any other way.

Poverty was all that she knew, and would ever know ~ because, it was the only story she was ever willing to tell.

My dears, sometimes, we can become so caught up in our own spinning thoughts ~ that we lose sight of the kindness that is right before us.

So, perhaps, just for today ~ we might find a way, to 'unstick' ourselves from the lines of these stories... just long enough to see the true beauty of this most magnficent world.

Namaste, and much love my dears...