Parable of the Chinese Farmer

Something to ponder. A parable my Mum’s partner has been telling me for a decade:

Once upon a time there was a Chinese farmer whose horse ran away. That evening all of his neighbours came around to commiserate. They said, “We are so sorry to hear your horse has run away. This is most unfortunate.” The farmer said, “It could be good, it could be bad, we don’t know the full story.”

The next day the horse came back bringing seven wild horses with it, in the evening everybody came back and said, “Oh, isn’t that lucky. What a great turn of events. You now have eight horses!” The farmer again said, “It could be good, it could be bad, we don’t know the full story.”

The following day his son tried to break one of the horses, and while riding it, he was thrown and broke his leg. The neighbours then said, “Oh dear, that’s too bad.” The farmer responded, “It could be good, it could be bad we don’t know the full story.”

The next day the conscription officers came around to conscript people into the army, and they rejected his son because he had a broken leg. Again all the neighbours came around and said, “Isn’t that great!” Again, he said, “It could be good, it could be bad we don’t know the full story.” 💭

The farmer refrained from thinking of things in terms of gain or loss, advantage or disadvantage because one never knows… In fact we never really know whether an event is fortune or misfortune, we only know our ever-changing reactions to ever-changing events. 

Last month my best friend Lucinda showered me with her wisdom, as she often does, telling me that something I was struggling with was “a gift.. it’s all a gift”. It took a while to process and make sense of it. Working to change your perspective can shift seeing ‘mistakes’ as just lessons for you to transcend and opportunities for expansion that really are gifts.

What appears as bad is most probably a gift and you don’t know the full story yet ☯️