A Seed Not Planted Cannot Grow
The Fundamental Law of Cause-and-Effect
One October, a man went on a trip to the East. A cool breeze blew through fields of ripened grain that stretched in waves of gold as far as the eye could see. Nearby a farmer was leisurely at work, smoking a pipe, his face creased in a smile.
Later the man returned to the same country, and found the waves of gold harvested into neat sheaves, lying piled by each house. From within came the sounds of contented conversation and laughter. The man said to himself, “This is a paradise. Imagine that—people here reap a great harvest with no trouble!” He could only envy such good fortune, and went and told his neighbor all about it.
His neighbor decided to take a look for himself. He set off at the beginning of May and arrived to find everyone covered in mud and sweat, hard at work. Thinking this was strange, he finished his business and went home. When he came by the following month, he found people sweating buckets in the hot sun, hard at work as before, with no golden waves in sight and no sheaves, either. He fumed, “My neighbor pulled a fast one on me. This is no paradise—itʼs a perfect hell.”
Hidden in every success story are tears.
A seed that is not planted cannot grow. People ignorant of this fundamental law of cause-andeffect are greatly to be pitied.
From Something You Forgot Along the Way, page 54
Source: The Buddhist Village Times #17 | 2012, A Seed Not Planted Cannot Grow
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