HOW TO LET GO IN LIFE AND BE HAPPY

Once upon a time two Buddhist monks were traveling through a forest. To reach from one place to another.

One of them was a senior monk and another was a junior monk. They were walking peacefully and with a calm mind to reach their destination.

At one point, they came across a river with a strong current of water.

To continue their journey, they would need to swim through the river and cross to the other side.

As the two monks were preparing to cross the river. They saw that a very young and beautiful woman was sitting at the back of the river. She did not know how to swim and requested the two monks to carry her on their backs to the other side of the river.

Buddhist monks take a vow of celibacy. They are not supposed to even look at women. The two monks glanced at each other because they had taken vows not to touch a woman.

They both thought for a moment. The junior monk politely refused, then without saying a word, the older monk went ahead and picked up the woman on his back and carried her across the river, placed her gently on the other side of the river, and started walking to carry on his journey. The younger monk couldn’t believe what had just happened. After rejoining his companion, he was speechless, without saying a word. The junior monk was shocked at the behavior of his fellow monk. He could not stop thinking about how his fellow monk had broken his vows by touching a woman. They kept walking through the forest for an hour or so without a word between them. Two more hours passed, then three, finally the younger monk could not contain himself any longer, and asked the senior monk, “Can I ask you a  question?”. The senior monk said, “Sure go ahead,” The junior monk said - ”I have been thinking about what you did at the river”. The senior monk said- “What did I do ?” The junior monk said- “you broke your vow to Buddhism when you touched the woman “while carrying her across the river and dropping her on the other side of the river. He continued saying to the senior monk. “As monks,we are not permitted to even touch a woman”. how could you then carry that woman on your back for so long. The senior monk laughed and said,”I dropped the woman on the back of the river a long time ago!”. “However, it seems that you are still carrying her around in your head!”.

This Buddhist zen story has a simple and beautiful message in it  for us. A message about living in the present moment. How many times in our own lives we are upset about things that have happened in the past.  We all go through the experience of quilting, regret, anger, frustration or any other negative emotion in our life. We carry on those hurts and resentment in our minds. But we forget that we cannot change the past no matter how long we carry on those thoughts in our mind. it will only causes us grief and suffering like that junior monk, on the other hand, that senior monk carried the woman across the river. then he dropped the woman and with it, he also dropped all the emotional baggage of that event in the past and moved on to the next, similarly, we can also cure this suffering easily by choosing to let go of what has happened in the past and concentrate on the present moment.