This is a story about prioritization. It is important right? How important? I think it is important enough to write a story about. Maybe you have heard the story, it is old enough to be there thousands of years. Story is as followed.
The monk who did not prioritize
Once there was an old monk. He had very few students with him. He taught them about life, meaning of life, about liberation from suffering, peace and silence. Everything you would become a monk for. Everything that you would try to find out being away from the formalities of a society. There was another monk, who was younger. He also was a chief monk in a nearby village. He was surrounded by full of energetic enthusiastic young monks. He was optimistic, about growth and development of the practice and equally Dearing to listen. He had mastered the art of meditation so much that he can reduce his weight and levitate. He could even move in air. And it took years of practice his meditation to get to this level and he occasionally did it in front of a crowd even. And people love to see such magic, and he had shown results of meditation unlike the monk who had nothing to show off. So, obviously followers are more, and he was famous.
One day both of the monks came to a river. The young monk saw the old monk with his followers, on the other side of the river. And he levitated over the river. With astonishments and whispers started on the opposite camp. One brave follower asked the old monk " Dear teacher, why do you let them to humiliate us? You must be knowing more tricks than that proud young monk. Why don't you do something. Maybe you can walk under the water."
With a kind smile old monk got on the ferry and crossed the river. And on the other side, he tossed a coin to the ferry owner and turned his disciples. "See, would you spend years of time meditating to gain something you can buy for half a penny?" He asked.
His disciples had no answers to his words of wisdom.
Prioritization for mindfulness- words of wisdom.
So, the moral of the story is you can end up in a wrong place if you did not prioritize your tasks. It is a key ingredient if you want to be somewhere at right time. True for many things we do in our lives, and it is true for mindfulness as well. In mindfulness prioritization is called wisdom. In previous article, do not start with mindfulness, do start with wisdom, I emphasized the fact that wisdom is key ingredient in mindfulness practice. Like the Yong monk, years of your practice would not make you end up being in the correct place.
So, we practice mindfulness/ living for correct reasons, which are,
To observe silence, to observe the nature, to observe the mind in wisdom on the process of living.
To observe our greed and defilements, and to observe these when they arise, like defeating the angry monster.
Wrong reasons, to practice are,
To stop defilements or try to defeat them, try to levitate at the end of the day.
To gain, wisdom, silence, psychic powers (observe is the correct word, not gain)
To get away from anything we dislike, stress, work, or problems in life.
It is so Suttle, that every word: gain, get away, stop, fight - has a doer in it who tries to gain something, while all there is to life is observation. Do not worry if you would not understand this at this time. It takes years of solidarity for wisdom to generate.
I know you are disagreeing with a lot of things. If you have, please post it. I will answer to best of my knowledge.
What is your story of prioritization?
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