Hardships, difficulties, trials, stress, and temptations — how do you react to all these adversities in life?
I know of a friend who committed suicide because his girlfriend dumped him for another man. There was also a business executive who quit his job because he could not stand the pressures of his work. A former colleague eloped with her boyfriend thinking that by going with him, she would be able to end her problems with her parents.
If you were in their shoes, what would you do? “If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it round,” said Oliver Wendell Holmes. “Trouble creates a capacity to handle it. I don’t embrace trouble; that’s as bad as treating it as an enemy. But I do say meet it as a friend, for you’ll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking terms with it.”
Philosopher Socrates once said, “If all misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.”
Every day, we experience different kinds of problems. Life would be boring if we don’t experience those challenges in life. A movie is not a movie without antagonists: the more wicked the villains are, the better. The same is true with life.
“He that has never suffered adversity is but half acquainted with others, or with himself. Constant success shows us but one side of the world. For, as it surrounds us with friends, who will tell us only our merits, so it silences those enemies from whom alone we can learn our defects,” Charles Caleb Colton reminds.
“Every problem has in it the seeds of its own solution,” said inspiration author Normal Vincent Peale. “If you don’t have any problems, you don’t get any seeds.” But you look at those problems is another matter.
In a little New England village, there is a church constructed entirely of cobblestones which two farmers gathered from their fields. Their neighboring farmers would curse the stones that broke their plow points; these two men transformed their obstacles into a church.
When the new church was to be dedicated, a famous clergyman who had begun his ministry in that same little village was invited back to speak. The hear of his memorable message was: “I want you to remember as from time to time you pass this lovely temple made of the common stones from your fields, that it is possible for every one of us to take the common things of life and make them beautiful.”
According to American president John F. Kennedy, the word “crisis” when written in the Chinese word is composed of two characters – one represents danger and the other represents opportunity. As Lucy Larcom puts it, “Like a plant that starts up in showers and sunshine and does not know which has best helped it to grow, it is difficult to say whether the hard things or the pleasant things did me the most good.”
A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.
Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil; without saying a word.
In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl. Now, turning to her daughter, she asked, “Tell me what you see.”
“Carrots, eggs, and coffee,” she replied. Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg.
Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, “What does it mean , mother?”
Her mother explained: Each of these objects had faced the same adversity: boiling water.
Each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.
“Which are you?” the mother asked her daughter. “When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?”
What about you? How do you handle adversity? Are you the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do you wilt and become soft and lose your strength?
Are you the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? You may have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trials, you become hardened and stiff ? Does your shell look the same, but on the inside you are bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?
Or are you like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest do you elevate yourself to another level?
Bestselling author Robert Fulghum dismisses it this way: “If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire, then you got a problem. Everything else is inconvenience.”
For comments, write me at henrytacio@gmail.com
I know of a friend who committed suicide because his girlfriend dumped him for another man. There was also a business executive who quit his job because he could not stand the pressures of his work. A former colleague eloped with her boyfriend thinking that by going with him, she would be able to end her problems with her parents.
If you were in their shoes, what would you do? “If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it round,” said Oliver Wendell Holmes. “Trouble creates a capacity to handle it. I don’t embrace trouble; that’s as bad as treating it as an enemy. But I do say meet it as a friend, for you’ll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking terms with it.”
Philosopher Socrates once said, “If all misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.”
Every day, we experience different kinds of problems. Life would be boring if we don’t experience those challenges in life. A movie is not a movie without antagonists: the more wicked the villains are, the better. The same is true with life.
“He that has never suffered adversity is but half acquainted with others, or with himself. Constant success shows us but one side of the world. For, as it surrounds us with friends, who will tell us only our merits, so it silences those enemies from whom alone we can learn our defects,” Charles Caleb Colton reminds.
“Every problem has in it the seeds of its own solution,” said inspiration author Normal Vincent Peale. “If you don’t have any problems, you don’t get any seeds.” But you look at those problems is another matter.
In a little New England village, there is a church constructed entirely of cobblestones which two farmers gathered from their fields. Their neighboring farmers would curse the stones that broke their plow points; these two men transformed their obstacles into a church.
When the new church was to be dedicated, a famous clergyman who had begun his ministry in that same little village was invited back to speak. The hear of his memorable message was: “I want you to remember as from time to time you pass this lovely temple made of the common stones from your fields, that it is possible for every one of us to take the common things of life and make them beautiful.”
According to American president John F. Kennedy, the word “crisis” when written in the Chinese word is composed of two characters – one represents danger and the other represents opportunity. As Lucy Larcom puts it, “Like a plant that starts up in showers and sunshine and does not know which has best helped it to grow, it is difficult to say whether the hard things or the pleasant things did me the most good.”
A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.
Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil; without saying a word.
In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl. Now, turning to her daughter, she asked, “Tell me what you see.”
“Carrots, eggs, and coffee,” she replied. Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg.
Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled as she tasted its rich aroma. The daughter then asked, “What does it mean , mother?”
Her mother explained: Each of these objects had faced the same adversity: boiling water.
Each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.
“Which are you?” the mother asked her daughter. “When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?”
What about you? How do you handle adversity? Are you the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do you wilt and become soft and lose your strength?
Are you the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? You may have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trials, you become hardened and stiff ? Does your shell look the same, but on the inside you are bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?
Or are you like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest do you elevate yourself to another level?
Bestselling author Robert Fulghum dismisses it this way: “If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire, then you got a problem. Everything else is inconvenience.”
For comments, write me at henrytacio@gmail.com
