A Few Stories To Think About
I just love stories, we can often recognise ourselves in the story and that can be just enough to put us on the road to change and improvement. Perhaps you will read these stories and ask yourself at the end what it is saying to you. You can then just simply send me an email with what it tells you.
The Elephant that Trapped Himself
So to begin the story, many years ago there is a man who travels to India. On his travels he reaches a village deep in the jungle. In this village they have many working elephants. The man watches the elephants and their keepers with great interest for many days.
He notices that each night the elephants are tied to a stump in the ground by a rope. Although the man has no experience with elephants it is obvious to him that any of these elephants could break free whenever they wished and simply make off into the jungle. This puzzles him greatly because the elephants are worked very hard, and would be much better off free in the jungle.
So, after a few days he plucks up courage to ask one of the elephant keepers about this.
The old wise Indian looks at the traveller kindly, invites him to sit down. Once comfortable, the Indian begins his tale.
"My friend, we take these elephants when they are very young. On the first night we tie them using the rope and the stump that they will be tied up with for the rest of their lives. "
"On that first night, and sometimes for many nights, the young elephants try with all their might to break free, but because they are young, their muscles, determination and minds are not yet developed enough so that they can focus their strength and break free."
"After a while, the young elephants give up trying to break the bonds that are tying them down."
"From that day on, they will never try again".
The old Indian gave the traveller a deep and meaningful look, took a sip of his tea, stood up and went on back to work.
The traveller sat for a while, silently, staring off into space. Suddenly, he rose, went to his tent, packed his bags and set off for home.
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The Student Archer
This is a story that sums so much up for me about what mental training is about that I have added a comment at the end.
There was a young student-archer who reached such proficiency in his art that he could shoot an arrow into a tree and then cleave that arrow into two with the next shot. He began to boast that he was a greater archer than his guru.
One day his guru, a venerable old man in his 70's, asked the youth to accompany him on a trip across the hills. The journey was uneventful until they came to a deep chasm.
A single log spanned the chasm. The guru walked down to the centre of the log, unshouldered his bow and taking an arrow shot it into a tree on the other side. His next shot cleaved the first arrow into two.
"Now it's your turn," he said, walking back to where his student was standing.
The youth stepped gingerly on the log and very slowly and carefully made his way to the middle. But his heart was in his mouth. He knew that if he lost his footing, he would plunge to his death. His hands trembled as he strung an arrow into his bow. Preoccupied with the danger he was in, he found it hard to focus on the target. Consequently when he let go of the arrow, it missed the tree altogether. Whimpering, he turned around.
"Help me!" he shouted to his guru. "I'll fall!"
The old man walked up to him, took his hand and stepping backwards led him to safety. Neither of them said a word on the return journey but the boy had much to think about. He had realised that to be a master of his art it was not enough to know how to control the bow, he had to learn how to control his mind too.
Brian's Comment.
Yes. Its a great story, but think about it. Did he need to control his mind ?
No!
He needed to let go of his fear ! That is not the same as control. When I control my mind then my fear is still there, but I am in so much control that I can go out on the log.
When I let go of the fear, I do not need to control my mind, because I have no fear.
When we can do that, when we can choose to let go of our fears, then we are FREE !
Free to perform at our best, whether it be sport or anything else.
And it doesn't mean we have to be reckless or stupid. If he was without fear he could still decide not to go out on the log, but it would be a decision based not on fear but on reason - so now he IS using his mind to decide.
There is a HUGE difference. When you can see this. Then you are on your way.
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