In the house of a famous swordsman named Shoken,
there lived a large rat that was fomenting trouble.
The swordsman brought in a female cat to kill the rat.
With pride, the cat arrived at the house of the swordsman.
The cat went into the room and saw the rat.
Surprisingly, the rat attacked the cat.
Shamefully the cat had to leave the house without being able to catch the rat.
The swordsman later invited a male cat since the female cat had failed in its attempt `to catch the rat.
In similar fashion as the female cat, the rat attacked the male cat.
The male cat too left the room unsuccessfully.
Puzzled by this turn of events, the cats called for a conference to discuss the matter.
Amongst them, a wise old female cat volunteered to catch the rat.
The swordsman was surprised to see the old cat.
The old cat went into the room and saw the large rat.
Both of them had an eye contact.
The old cat approached the rat, took it in her mouth, and quietly left the room.
The other cats asked the old cat to divulge the secret of her success.
The old cat replied, 'All of you have used techniques to catch the rat and the rat had better techniques to counter you.
Whereas, I went with emptiness.
When I was void, I had no form, no desire to attack.
When one has no form and desire, then one is not a threat to an other.
Then a great energy .. the divine energy flows through us.
When there is 'I,' there is a form and one's form is a threat to the other form.
When there is no 'I,' there is no threat to the other, and hence no enmity.
I allowed existence to decide who to catch whom?
That was the secret of my success.
'The great swordsman bowed down to the old female cat
and said, 'You are speaking Zen.
I have the theory and you have the practice.'
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Long ago in Persia, there lived a king,
who was interested in seeking answers to his spiritual questions
but could not get the right answers.
He went and met a great mystic called Zarathustra
and asked him for words of wisdom.
Instead of giving the king words of wisdom,
Zarathustra gave him wheat seeds.
The king felt insulted, threw the seeds and went away.
He continued on his pursuit of acquiring more wealth.
At the fag end of his life, he felt he had given away his life for wealth
and it would not protect him at the time of his death.
He pondered whether he had invested his life wrongly.
He once again sent word to the great mystic Zarathustra
to bestow upon him his words of wisdom.
Again, the mystic presented wheat seeds to the king.
The king felt he was not mature enough to understand
Zarathustra's message and kept the seeds in his prayer room.
Later, the king called a philosopher from India to teach and guide him.
The philosopher told the king that the real purpose of his coming was not to teach the king,
but to meet the mystic Zarathustra.
The king showed the philosopher the seeds sent by the mystic.
Looking at the seeds, the philosopher cried aloud,
'What words of wisdom! what seeds of wisdom! what a great teaching!
' The king pleaded with the philosopher to elaborate.
The philosopher replied,
'The seeds appear to be finite,
but they have infinite capacity to grow.
From a seed, a tree and from a tree again a seed and so on.
In the same way, we appear to be finite like this seed,
but deep within we have infinite capacity to grow.
Secondly, unless the seed is willing to give up its seed-hood,
it cannot grow.
Similarly, unless we are willing to bury
our past we cannot grow to a new future.
The art of wise living is the art of dying.
Finally, when you plant seeds in the ground,
invisible forces like water, heat, air will help the seed sprout.
One should have trust. In life too,
we should trust goodness and the invisible
forces would help us get enlightened.
'Both the king and the philosopher met Zarathustra.
He welcomed them but did not teach them anything.
He asked them to observe him and learn.
While they were gardening in the company of the great mystic,
they realized that any species survives only if it is organic.
If a seed is unwilling to multiply, the species will die.
Likewise, goodness and wisdom should also be organic.
Learn to spread this goodness and wisdom.
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swami sukhbodhanand
