Letting Go - A Parable

This parable is often used by Buddhist teachers to teach the lesson of letting go. If we want to be free we have to let go of our greed, our attachment, and all the baggage, that are weighing us down. I hope you will like the parable.

A master took his two students into a forest. There he took a hollow coconut with a small hole and inserted sweet rice. Then he tied it to a tree and waited with his students nearby. Soon, a monkey came along, sniffed the rice, inserted his paw, and screeched in frustration when he was unable to withdraw his paw, (now a fist clenching the rice), through the narrow opening.

“Let go of the rice, silly! Run!” shouted the students, amazed by its obvious stupidity, but to no avail.

“What was the trap that caught the monkey?” asked the master.

“Rice,” said one student.

“The coconut,” said another.

“No,” replied the wise master, “The trap was greed. He only had to let go of his attachment, to be free. Likewise, we are the ones who trap ourselves. We are always responsible. The real trap is always within, not out there. The causes of suffering are in us. External situations are only conditions.”

With that, he hacked the coconut open, and the unrepentant monkey ran away with a fistful of rice.

Moral of the story:
If you want to be free, you must learn to let go. Why do you cling to pain? Why hold on to the very thing which keeps you from hope, love and happiness.

Let go and you are free. It is as simple as that. Letting go doesn’t mean giving up, but rather accepting that there are things that cannot be. Some things are hard to let go of, I understand. But what’s the point of holding onto something that’s causing you pain and unhappiness?

Let go. Better things are awaiting you. But you will never know, you will never find out what lovely things are just around the corner unless you let go of what’s holding you back.

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