My favorite parable // The spoon and the paintings

July 22, 2022 · living

A parable I heard many years ago. I guess this one has stuck with me because I still struggle with it. Anyway:

A young fella has been having a tough time and decides to make the trip to see the wise man up the mountain. Hopes he might come back with an answer or two.

Arriving, he’s surprised to find himself at neither a hut nor a hovel, but at a beautiful, bustling estate. As he loiters uncertainly in the entry hall, the kid is approached by a kind-faced, well-dressed man who explains that he’s got some things to take care, and then the two of them can sit down to talk. He suggests that the young man explore the grounds while he waits.

Oh, but just one thing, he says: I need you to hold onto this for me. He hands the kid a spoon, onto which he plops a drop of oil. Wander around, enjoy, explore, but don’t drop that oil. If you’ve still got it after an hour, we’ll talk.

Weird ask, thinks the kid, but he’s not leaving empty-handed, so he’ll play the game. He shuffles carefully through the halls, eyes locked on his spoon, hunched forward and elbows out to form a protective bubble against careless bumps from less attentive visitors.

An hour later, the man finds the kid already waiting in the entry hall and says, hey, you’ve still got the oil, that’s great! But first, what did you think of my home? The paintings? The gardens? The stairwell’s dancing beams of colored light? The kid’s embarrassed to admit that he was too fixated on the spoon to notice much else.

So he gets sent back once more, just to take it all in. And boy does he ever — everywhere he looks is the most incredible thing he’s ever seen, and it just keeps getting better. Another hour later (and a couple minutes late), the kid rushes into the lobby, giddily excited to share everything he’s seen.

Until the man gestures winkingly toward the forgotten spoon, and the boy’s heart drops fast enough to leave him queasy. Had he come so far only to throw it all away over gawking at some… paintings!? He’s already beating himself up over such a monumentally stupid blunder — typical him, he’s thinking — when the man interrupts him out of it.

Alright kid, listen:

You gotta show up for everything that’s around you: see it, savor it, learn about it, love it.

But you can’t forget about the spoon.

The spoon ain’t the point of anything, but it does matter.

You just gotta find your way to do both things.

–

← all writing