Many years ago, I came across this story of two monks. It goes like this:
An old monk and a young monk were traveling together. They came to this river where the water was flowing very swiftly. There was a very pretty lady standing beside it. The lady asked the two monks if they could carry her on their back to cross the river. The young monk who thought that it was totally inappropriate to touch the lady wanted to turn her down. But the old monk smiled cheerfully and offered to carry her.
So the old monk carried the lady on his back and cross the river. Once they crossed the river, the lady offered her thanks, went her separate way, and the two monk continued their journey. As they walked, the young monk was furious. He was wondering how could the old monk, who was such a religious person, who chant many times a day, could even allow himself to touch the lady. The more he thought about it, the more furious he was. After a while, he couldn’t control himself any longer and reprimanded the old monk.
“How you could allow yourself, a religious man, to touch a woman and even carry her on your back?”, the young man demanded.
The old monk blinked, and looked astonished. “Which woman are you referring to?”, he asked.
The young monk grew even more angry, how could he pretend nothing had happened? “The one at the river!”, he almost shouted.
The old monk smiled, “Oh that lady! I have already let her off my back and forgotten about her. It seems you are the one still carrying her on your back.”
While the story has to do with Buddhism teaching, I believe the moral of the story applies to everyone. I believe it is only when we allow ourselves to forgive, we will be able to accept what happened, and that is when we can truly move on and embrace fully what life has to offer. If we try to move on with the burden of the past on our backs, eventually it will weigh us down, it becomes tiring, we cannot fully appreciate what life has to offer as we are constantly conscious of this burden on our backs.
There are many incidents that happened in my life, and I was furious and hurt at the people responsible when it happened. Some of them, well I have forgiven them, and as for the rest, I am working towards it. There are a couple that I thought I had let go, thought that I have moved on, but in reality, I was still very much carrying it on my back.
It is when I no longer carry anything on my back, that I can move forward and fully embrace my life.
