We Are All Meant to “Fly”…
We are all meant to transcend our apparent limitations…
Once there was a king who received a gift of two magnificent falcons from Arabia. They were peregrine falcons, the most beautiful birds he had ever seen. He gave the precious birds to his head falconer to be trained. Months passed and one day the head falconer informed the king that though one of the falcons was flying majestically, soaring high in the sky, the other bird had not moved from its branch since the day it had arrived.
The king summoned healers and sorcerers from all the land to tend to the falcon, but no one could make the bird fly. He presented the task to the member of his court, but the next day, the king saw through the palace window that the bird had still not moved from its perch.
Having tried everything else, the king thought to himself, “May be I need someone more familiar with the countryside to understand the nature of this problem.” So he cried out to his court, “Go and get a farmer.”
In the morning, the king was thrilled to see the falcon soaring high above the palace gardens. He said to his court, “Bring me the doer of this miracle.”
The court quickly located the farmer, who came and stood before the king. The king asked him, “How did you make the falcon fly?”
With his head bowed, the farmer said to the king, “It was very easy, your majesty. I simply cut the branch where the bird was sitting.”
Lesson:
We are all made to “fly”…to realize our incredible potential as human beings. But instead of doing that, we sit on our own little branches, clinging to the things that are familiar to us. The possibilities are endless, but for most of us, they remain undiscovered. We conform to the familiar, the comfortable, the mundane. We are reluctant to get out of our comfort zone. So, for the most part, our lives are mediocre instead of exciting, thrilling and fulfilling.
One may have noticed that a turtle makes progress only when it sticks out its neck…
“Take a chance! All life is a chance. The man who goes furthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare.” — Dale Carnegie
“The only thing that stands between a man and what he wants from life is often merely the will to try it and the faith to believe that it is possible.” — Richard M. DeVos
So let us learn to destroy the branch of attachment and fear we cling to, which pulls us down and free ourselves to experience the glory of total freedom as the birds in flight — into the infinite!!!
We should take the flight with the two wings of discriminative intellect (viveka) and dispassion (vairagya), fueled by a burning desire for freedom from all limitations of space, time and causation (mumukshutvam) and piloted by the knowledge of the Absolute Truth (Brahma jnana) and soar into the realm of Absolute, Infinite, Eternal Bliss.
“Continuous effort — not strength or intelligence — is the key to unlocking our potential.” — Liane Cardes
