rouke

This is a story a very wise buddist monk told me once. I didn't realize how true it was, until I recovered from my breakdown;

I prisoner was taken to a cave and told that he had enough food to keep him alive for forty days and nights. The guard told him they would come back in forty days to see if he had escaped or died. They put the prisoner in the cave and rolled a big stone over the entrance. The prisoner looked around and saw light streaming in from a hole in the ceiling of the cave. He decided that he would collect all the stones in the cave and build a pile high enough to crawl out the hole in the ceiling. On the 40th day he looked up and thought he was close enough to reach the hole. He climbed up the pile of rocks and stood on the very top but he was inches away from being able to reach the opening. He scrambled down the pile and crawled all around the floor of the cave looking for one more stone. He was totally exhausted and had no more energy to even move. The next day the big stone was rolled away from the cave door and they find the man laying at the bottom of a mound of rocks almost in reach of the opening in the ceiling above but as the guard walked around the mound he noticed a hole in the wall on the opposite side of the cave. The guard crawled through the hole and came out into brillant sunlight. The man only looked into the light for his way out and never looked into the darkness to find his way out.

It wasn't until I was in the depths of my darkness that I saw the light.

If my father hadn't died, if my divorce hadn't happened, if I didn't quit my job, if the girl I was dating hadn't dumped me, I never would have desended into the my own darkness and been able to come out the other side.

I hope everyone will find the courage to love themselves.