Story Practices

Once upon a time there lived a quillfish in the Northern pacific ocean. This quillfish was a curious quillfish. It wanted to seek out the world and understand what exactly comprised the universe. It wanted to understand how the universe was created. What forces ran it? How come there was so much destruction all around? What was responsible. And what protected the universe and what helped transform all beings in the universe? And what was the purpose of existence? And what was the purpose of life? These were the questions the quillfish had. The quillfish decided to swim and it swam and it swam and it swam and it swam and it swam. It was by nature a fish and it swam, but it decided to swim far away. It decided to swim and go to India. Because it has heard all the answers were in India. It swam upto the Indian ocean. There it met a great white shark. The great white shark asked the quillfish what it wanted. The quillfish said, “I want the answers to the questions of life existence and everything.” The great white shark who was an enlightened great white shark did not eat the quillfish. And the quillfish was grateful because of this. After that day the quillfish never understood the purpose of life but did understand gratitude. Because of this it was known as the grateful quillfish for it had understood that it had not been eaten by the great white shark it met.

The story of the cobra and the sandalwood tree

Once upon a time, there was a wonderful sandalwood tree that had the best fragrance in the world. And next to the sandalwood tree there lived a cobra and this cobra would keep biting the sandalwood tree and the sandalwood tree would keep passing its fragrance to the cobra. People would ask the cobra, “Why do you bite this tree which gives you its fragrance?”

The cobra would say, “It is my nature.”

People would ask the sandalwood tree, “Why do you keep giving fragrance to this cobra that keeps biting you?”

The sandalwood tree would say, “It’s my nature.”

Now it so happened that a woodcutter was passing by and he was thinking of cutting of the sandalwood tree. But as it happened he saw the cobra and ran off. This happened once, twice, thrice, hundred times, two hundred times – many times it happened. Now the cobra lived for a long time, because it had after all the nagamani – it was a immortal cobra. And in midst of all this the sandalwood tree also lived for a long time. It was a evergreen, everfresh, ever fragrant sandalwood tree. And that was the story of the cobra and sandalwood tree.

The story of the venomous snake that wanted to fly

Once upon a time, there was a venomous snake, but it was not concerned with the fact that it was venomous and could kill living beings. It had no interest in doing such things. What it wanted to do was travel and see the world and it specifically wanted to see space. And it wanted to see the sky and it wanted to live in the sky. And it wanted to live among the clouds. And it wanted to see the sun from up close. But it lived on land and had venom in its body. Because it had venom – nobody would talk to it. Because it was venomous and because it lived on land, all it could do was slither here and there. In the meantime, it found a book. In that book it read a wonderful word. And that word was ‘BE’. And it liked the idea of being so it would just be it would just be, just slither around. But it got into the habit of reading books. Soon it found one book called Yoga Vashsistha. In yoga Vashishta too there was a sentence it liked, “you can be whatever your mind keeps thinking about.” So, it said I want to be a bird that’s what I want to be. So, it kept thinking about Garuda the eagle and soon it turned into a bird and it could fly. And it flew straight into the sky. And it started living next to the sun. And it was the happiest creature on the planet.

The story of the rat and the fish

Once upon a time there was a little rat and it was very very scared of water, however at the same time there lived a fish who loved being in water, naturally because he was a fish. Now it so happened that the rat was a magical rat and the fish was a magical fish. Now the problem was that the rat could not meet anyone who was magical in land and the fish could not meet anyone who was magical in sea. So, they accidently met one day when the rat was running around the beach after being chased by a cat. The rat realised the fish was magical and fish realised the rat was magical. Now the fish could not live in water and meet another magical being and the rat could not live in land meet another magical being. But the fish could not live on land and the rat could not live in the sea – so they could hardly see each other and that was their story.

The story of elephant and the cat

Once upon a time in the forest, there lived an elephant. This elephant was a small baby elephant. And it liked all living creatures, and it was also very very fond of the Buddha who lived close by. It would often go to the Buddhist ashram and hear sermons of the Buddha. And it will come back and narrate these sermons back to its family. And its family was very very thrilled to hear these sermons from the baby elephant. One day while the elephant was walking on its way to the Buddhist camp, it tripped and it fell on a cat. It was a small cat and the cat cried out loud. It said, “Aaah you are hurting me. You don’t want me to live.”

The elephant was horrified. It said, “I am sorry, I tripped by mistake and I fell on top of you, don’t feel bad. I will tell you what is to be done, show me your wounds.”

But the small cat refused to show its wounds. The baby elephant felt bad but knew it was his fault. He said, “Come we will go to the river, you can drink some water, you will feel better.”

The cat refused to walk with the baby elephant. In this manner the cat refused everything the baby elephant offered it. And the baby elephant, the baby elephant felt really sad. Finally, the baby elephant said, “I am going to the Buddha’s ashram, if you come with me we can hear a nice discourse.”

But this time the cat did not refuse, “Huh the Buddha, I also have a question for the Buddha, I’ll come with you.” So, the cat suddenly got up, it was pretending to be very ill, it got and it jumped on the elephants tail and rode upto the Buddha’s ashram. In the Buddha’s ashram it went up and asked a question, “Does the cat have a Buddha nature?” it asked. The Buddha looked compassionately at the cat and said, “Mew.”