Aesop's Fables

The Lesson I Learned From Aesop’s Fables

Aesop was a Greek writer and master of many fables.  Now some might ask, “What is a fable?”  Well, if you don’t know, then that is a very good question!  Never be afraid to enlighten your mind by asking that, which you do not know!  A fable is a short narrative; a story, a recount of something as if it was true and it teaches a lesson.  I love a lot of Aesop’s fables, but ‘The Farmer and The Snake,’ has always been a favorite of mine.  It has also been in my heart all night and all day.  Let me share with you my favorite fable by Aesop. 

The Farmer and the Snake:  One winter a farmer found a snake stiff and frozen with cold. He had compassion on it, and taking it up, placed it in his bosom.  The warmth quickly revived the Snake, and resuming its natural instincts, bit its benefactor, inflicting on him a mortal wound. "Oh," cried the farmer with his last breath, "I am rightly served for pitying a scoundrel."

The lesson: The greatest kindness will not bind the ungrateful.

The reason this has been in my heart all night and all day, is because yesterday, I almost picked that frozen snake up.  In a moment of uncertainty, I stopped and I looked…and I was almost reaching for the snake when I realized what I was about to do! 

Straight truth:  No, I am not cheerful and happy all of the time!  No I am not nice and kind all of the time.  Actually, I would never use kind as an adjective to describe me.  No, I am not positive all the time.  Yes I am a flawed person!    Yes, I am damn right mean and surly at times, but do I need to take it out on everyone?  No!  Do I have to be mad at the world because I am angry at something or someone?  No!  Does everyone have to incur my wrath and rage, if they are not the cause of that wrath or rage?  I certainly hope not, because it is not a pretty sight! 

BUT:  I am honest with myself, and I know my personal boundary and my limitations.  I am still positive, that being positive through any adversity will make any negative in my life less of a negative.  I am also positive that any kindness I do in life will come back to me when I least expect it to come back.  I still believe that there is goodness in people, even when they don’t believe it is there in them.  I will continue to use positive posting as a means of respondent conditioning!  I still hold true to PRAYER, FAITH, HOPE, and LOVE!

As Aesop’s fable has clearly shown, if a person is truly unhappy, ungrateful, or miserable, it doesn’t matter what I, or anyone does as far as being positive or happy, because they will always try to bring you down to their level of ungratefulness and unhappiness.  As for me, well, I am refusing to play games with that frozen snake!   ~Muriel (5/23/13)