DRAGONFLY

At the bottom of a quiet pond lived a little colony of water bugs. They were a happy colony, living far from the sun. They did notice that every once in a while one from their colony seemed to lose interest in going about with his friends, and clinging to a lily stalk, he gradually moved out of sight and was seen no more. “Look!” said one of the water bugs to others. “One from our colony is climbing up the lily stalk. Where do you think she’s going? Wasn’t she happy here? Where do you suppose she went?” No one had an answer. Finally one of the water bugs spoke up, “I Have an idea. The next one of us to climb up the lily stalk must promise to come back and tell the rest of us where he went and why.”

As providence would have it, the very water bug who had suggested the plan found himself climbing up the lily stalk. Up, and up and up he went. Before he knew what was happening, he had broken through the surface of the water and fallen onto a broad lily pad above. When he opened his eyes, he couldn’t believe what he saw. A startling change had come over his old body. His movements revealed four silver wings and a long tail. Even as he struggled, he felt an impulse to move his wings. The warmth of the sun soon dried the moisture from his new body. He moved his wings again and suddenly found himself above the water. He had become a dragonfly.

Swooping and dipping in great curves, he flew through the air. He felt exhilarated in the new atmosphere. Every now and then, the new dragonfly landed happily on a lily pad to rest. It was then that he chanced to look below, at the bottom of the pond. He was right above his old friends, the water bugs! Then the dragonfly remembered the promise. Without thinking, he dived down. He hit the surface of the water and bounced away. He winged off happily into his wonderful new world of sun and air. After experiencing the freedom of his new surroundings for some time, he again landed to rest on the lily pad, of course, having realized….. “If I had not chosen to outgrow the colony of water bugs, to which I was so attached, I would ever become a dragonfly. Now that I have become a dragonfly, even if I want, I can never go back to where I came from. Even if I somehow manage to go back, the colony of water bugs – my old friends – will no longer be able to recognize me in new form…. they won’t understand me. I have to wait till one of them also becomes a dragonfly, for, only then will they understand what has happened to me.”


COMMENTS:

The law of life is ‘When the lower is pushed, the higher delights’. When the body is pushed beyond its perceived limits the mind delights. When the body tells you ‘I can’t walk one more block. I can’t run another lap. I can trek no more,’ and then when it is pushed beyond its perceived limits and when it walks that additional block, runs another lap and treks further – the mind delights. Against the pleading of your body when you do a few more push- ups or few more reps of the bicep curls or another dozen squats – the mind delights. When the lower – the body is pushed, the higher – the mind delights.”

Struggle, suffering, challenges, testing period, tough times – in fact, all these are vocabulary of a man who is seeing only the lower being pushed without recognizing how the higher delights in the process. You are saying the caterpillar is being pushed. I am saying the butterfly is born. Every time man is pushed and got delights… for, it is through this push, man is created. Align yourself to this spiritual truth and so much of your life will change.

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Source: Excerpt from the article published in “Frozen Thoughts” April 2008.