I found this poem, Lessons from Oyster, by chance while surfing the net this morning.I can imagine the pain any oyster must have felt the moment the grain of sand gets into its shell. I went running yesterday evening. Hoping to start training for a quarter marathon (10km) at the end of this year. I had just covered less than 3km when I felt some discomfort on my right foot. It was not difficult to conclude that a grain of sand had found its way into my running shoes. Even with the thick socks that I was wearing, it was really uncomfortable for me to continue running. I covered about 7km yesterday. Upon finishing, I just had to take off my shoe to "confront" this little grain of sand that granted me pure agony with each step I took.
Back to the oyster. Instead of lamenting on its ill-luck, discomfort or any other external elements, it handled it the way this good poem stated.
What about us mortal-beings that call ourselves the most intelligent species that walks on earth? When a grain of sand gets into your life, how do you react? Can you make the best of it like how oysters with such primitive brains react?
When that demanding boss barks at you. Or faced with a friend we perceived as inconsiderate. When work load gets suffocating. What do you do? When met with one test after another in the rhythm of life. When both spirit and flesh are just as weak. What do you do?
Are you an Oyster?
28 Ripples:
LOVE the story (poem). Love your questions. Now I have to sit still and think for a while.
THANKS for sharing, Karen! ;-D
Hi Karen! You craft such unique perspectives in your posts! It made me think of how many terrible things I've been through that have become elements of beauty in my own life. When something is festering in our lives, it's amazing how often we end up learning something wonderful, getting over something or simply becoming a better person. This month for me has been one of the happiest I've had in years and I owe most of it to blogging. I have dug much deeper into myself than ever before and I've learned that it's a good thing to love myself! Thanks Kare:)
Hi Karen,
Somehow if I am not mistaken, I felt that most of our topics lately were closely related and were trying to achieve on thing - to console our friends.
How we ought to react are found in my recent topics such as
- Concern but Don't Worry
- Don't get discouraged or depressed
- You are happier by being grateful
Blessings to you, Karen!
Let's Acquire Wisdom and Live with Passion
Hi Amel,
I am glad that my humble writings can encourage your quiet contemplations. Thanks for dropping by!
Blessings!
Hi Bobby!
Thanks for your comments! I applaud your ability to learn through the different facets that life offers you.
Through writing this post and putting down those questions, they serve most importantly to remind myself to appreciate aspects of life that I have yet to be able to understand the divine intentions behind them.
Blessings Bobby!
Hi Sam!
Thanks for leaving those good links for me to explore! I will read them when time permits!
Haha! You replied to my comments in your good blog that Great Minds think alike! I am grateful that my shallow mind can at times think alike with someone great like you and our good Surjit!
This post of yours reminds me to take each difficulty and challenge and do my best with it.Sometimes its not as easy as it sounds, I have to really remind myself a lot. But often, a beautiful pearl is the result of my earlier problem.You are right, many times when faced with tiny obstacles, we as a species cannot cope very well.Still, we are all learning...and most of us probably try to do our best!Very interesting post again...I enjoyed it throughly :)
yes, you are right Karen.Most of us become victim to adverse situations. But getting discouraged or depressed will take us nowhere. We have to face the situation and get out of it. A thought provoking post.
God bless.
wow karen lovely poem what i get out of it to tell myself that the pain and the hard times i face sometimes i can improve it instead of removing it...thx for sharing this
Blessings
Hi Jesse!
Thanks for your insight! I do agree that talking and blogging about it is one thing. Actually doing it is another, indeed! And you are right! We are all learning in this Great School of Life! Let's be kind to one another. In good company, running with grains of sand inside the shoes makes it more bearable.
Blessings!
Thanks Surjit!
Indeed! Being discouraged or depressed ain't going to do any ounce to good. In fact, it would only cause one to perceive the whole situation to be more hopeless.
The Buddha said,"Subject to Change are all Things. Strive on with Diligence!"
Blessings to you!
Hi Lili!
Thanks for your comments! Indeed, hard times serve as wonderful good lessons if we know how to make use of them. Easier said than done. But with determination and a sincere wish to live a good life, walking each step with gratitude and awareness, I am sure we can learn to see the divine lessons that each obstacle is serving for us.
Blessings to you Lili!
hi karen! thanks for sharing! you make me ponder on the obstacles im facing at work. I shall be the oyster. :)
JeanChia
Karen,
Such a beautiful poem to remind of what my respectful instructor of Core Value Training, Ko Hayashi about Pearl in the Oyster.
Oyster is living the sea world. There are alot of stuff under the sea. So the oyster is jus such a little tiny charactor in the sea movie. They encountered many un-invited guest entering their body like sand, mud, grains and even worst like toxin.
But they never give up in growing and lightening up their wonderful and gorgeous PEARL. This is what we call our inner-self.
We need alot of challenge and painful moments to help us in realising who we really are.
Without this un-invited guests, we might not able to understand what kind of life we are living right now. What's truth and what's the illusion?
Direct Question: What is the higher purpose of your life? Money or True Relationship?
Karen. Everyone of us would want to be an oyster. I want to be an oyster after going through many challenges and low in life. As some of the early commenter wrote, it will need some painful experiences to get us realize it. When we are young, we think differently and go for power, fame and $$$. It is not easy too be an oyster, it require patience and sacrifices. :)
Wow Karen, what nice insightful comments you get! I need to go check out some of these commentators blogs! Your blog has become one of my favourites:)
Hey Jean!
Thanks for your comments and I am glad my shallow writings could lead you to contemplation. Let me know of any of your enlightenments to benefit me as well.
Blessings Jean!
Hi Jamilla!
Your comments have added more depth to my humble post! Thanks! Like what Sam has commented, it takes experience and age to learn to really appreciate these "un-invited guests" in our lives. It is often in face with challenging moments and obstacles that our potential will spring forth and make us a better person.
To answer to your question on my higher purpose in life. It is simply to be aware.
Hi Bobby!
You flatter me! I am honoured by your visits and kind comments!
Blessings & Happy Tuesday!
BTW .. I like your new post on ego. Hope visitors to my blog will benefit from it as much as I did:
http://revellian.com/2007/09/10/blogging-ego/
Hi Sam!
Yes you are right. Much as all of us would want to be the Oyster .. It takes sacrifice and experience to really be able to do it in our journey of life.
Maybe you wish to guide me more on how to be an Oyster?
I don't know what I am anymore, though I'd like to become an oyster
Hi Karen,
We have a lot to learn from this world of nature... ;-)
Too often I allow life to irritate me... thank you for reminding me to make a pearl out of a grain of sand!
Warmest wishes and much gratitude for your help...
Jen
Hi Jac,
I have moments like this too. I call it the conflict between Theory & Reality!
I encounter as states of being lost as well. A lot of what I write in my humble blog serve mainly to remind myself what I have yet to achieve. To reflect through the process of writing.
You are one tough gal that some divine powers have offered you much challenges to explore. It might be choppy waters now, but at least you are still swimming very well!
"A ship is safest at the port. But that was not what ships were built for."
Blessings Jac!!
Hi Jenn!!
You are absolutely right. Things can irritate us, put us down or have any effect on us only when we allow them to.
To be frank, my mind would naturally aspire to be as never-say-die as oyster. But I know myself better when Sands in my life come a knocking. But well, I guess the cycle of failing and retrying is also an important part of spiritual cultivation. What do you think?
Blessings Jennifer! Thanks for your visit! Have a Good Day!
Hey Karen...
Love this post of yours.
For me, the grain of sand that I am still trying to absorb are the demotivating words from others that make me feel like I do not deserve to live.
Hope that I can slowly learn to be the oyster. In other words, learn to take all these in my own stride, and perhaps make the best use of them instead of grumbling over them.
Thanks for enlightening us with this one! =)
Hey waterlearner,yup.. i like this poem and totally agree with the moral of the poem. This days, so many folks are out there critizing this and that, but they never understand that constructive critisizm is the way to go.
Nafa,
You guys are doing really fine. Like I said earlier, these people are just plain jealous!!
Blessings!
Hi Kev,
Thanks for dropping by. Hope to see you visiting and your comments often.
I love this poem, too. It reminds me to take all things in a constructive manner.
Blessings!
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