Thinking "Out of the Box"

Many hundreds of years ago in a small Italian town, a merchant had the misfortune of owing a large sum of money to the moneylender. The moneylender, who was old and ugly, fancied the merchant's beautiful daughter so he proposed a bargain. He said he would forgo the merchant's debt if he could marry the daughter. Both the merchant and his daughter were horrified by the proposal.
The moneylender told them that he would put a black pebble and a white pebble into an empty bag. The girl would then have to pick one pebble from the bag. If she picked the black pebble, she would become the moneylender's wife and her father's debt would be forgiven. If she picked the white pebble she need not marry him and her father's debt would still be forgiven. But if she refused to pick a pebble, her father would be thrown into jail.
They were standing on a pebble strewn path in the merchant's garden. As they talked, the moneylender bent over to pick up two pebbles. As he picked them up, the sharp-eyed girl noticed that he had picked up two black pebbles and put them into the bag. He then asked the girl to pick her pebble from the bag.
What would you have done if you were the girl? If you had to advise her, what would you have told her? Careful analysis would produce three possibilities:
1. The girl should refuse to take a pebble.
2. The girl should show that there were two black pebbles in the bag and expose the moneylender as a cheat.
3. The girl should pick a black pebble and sacrifice herself in order to save her father from his debt and imprisonment.
The above story is used with the hope that it will make us appreciate the difference between lateral and logical thinking.
The girl put her hand into the moneybag and drew out a pebble. Without looking at it, she fumbled and let it fall onto the pebble-strewn path where it immediately became lost among all the other pebbles.
"Oh, how clumsy of me," she said. "But never mind, if you look into the bag for the one that is left, you will be able to tell which pebble I picked." Since the remaining pebble is black, it must be assumed that she had picked the white one. And since the moneylender dared not admit his dishonesty, the girl changed what seemed an impossible situation into an advantageous one.
MORAL OF THE STORY: Most complex problems do have a solution, sometimes we have to think about them in a different way.

Not Money but Love !!

Some time ago, a man punished his 3-year-old daughter for wasting a roll of gold wrapping paper. Money was tight and he became infuriated when the child tried to decorate a box to put under the Christmas tree.
Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift to her father the next morning and said, “This is for you, Daddy.” He was embarrassed by his earlier overreaction, but his anger flared again when he found the box was empty.
He yelled at her, “Don’t you know that when you give someone a present, there’s supposed to be something inside it?”
The little girl looked up at him with tears in her eyes and said,”Oh, Daddy, it is not empty. I blew kisses into the box. All for you, Daddy.”
The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little girl, and he begged for her forgiveness. It is told that the man kept that gold box by his bed for years and whenever he was discouraged, he would take out an imaginary kiss and remember the love of the child who had put it there.
In a very real sense, as a human we have been given a gold container filled with unconditional love from our children, friends, family and may be from unknown persons. There is no more precious possession anyone could hold than real love. Feel , value and share it always !!

Reality Is Priceless

A teacher was tutoring a class of students when she relayed a story about a cruise ship capsized while at sea, and on the ship was a couple that managed to make their way to a lifeboat but realized there was only space for one. story. 
A cruise ship met with an incident at sea. On the ship was a couple, after having made their way to the lifeboat, they realized that there was only space for one person left.
At this moment, the man pushed the woman behind him and jumped onto the lifeboat himself.
The lady stood on the sinking ship and shouted one sentence to her husband.
The teacher stopped and asked, "What do you think she shouted?"
Most of the students excitedly answered, "I hate you! I was blind!"
Now, the teacher noticed a boy who was silent throughout, she got him to answer and he replied, "Teacher, I believe she would have shouted - Take care of our child!"
The teacher was surprised, asking "Have you heard this story before?"
The boy shook his head, "Nope, but that was what my mom told my dad before she died to disease".
The teacher lamented, "The answer is right".
The cruise ship sunk. The man went home and brought up their daughter single-handedly.
Many years later after the death of the man, their daughter found his diary while tidying his belongings.
It turns out that when parents went onto the cruise ship, the mother was already diagnosed with a terminal illness. At the critical moment, the father rushed to the only chance of survival.
He wrote in his diary, "How I wished to sink to the bottom of the ocean with you, but for the sake of our daughter, I can only let you lie forever below the sea alone".
The story is finished, the class was silent.

The teacher knows that the student has understood the moral of the story, that of the good and the evil in the world, there are many complications behind them which are hard to understand.
Which is why we should never only focus on the surface and judge others without understanding them first.
Those who like to pay the bill, do so not because they are loaded but because they value friendship above money.
Those who apologize first after a fight, do so not because they are wrong but because they value the people around them.
Those who are willing to help you, do so not because they owe you anything but because they see you as a true friend.
Those who often text you, do so not because they have nothing better to do but because you are in their heart.
One day, all of us will get separated from each other; we will miss our conversations of everything and nothing; the dreams that we had. Days will pass by, months, years, until this

Judging Another

My boss drove a luxury car every day and it was my duty to greet him and to open the gates for him, as I worked as a watchman in his villa. But he never responded back to my greetings. One day he saw me opening the garbage bags outside the villa in search for any leftover food. But, as usual he never even looked at me, it was like as if he never saw anything!   The very next day I saw a paper bag at the same place, but it was clean and the food inside was covered well. It was fresh and good food like someone had just brought it from the supermarket. I didn't bother as to where it came from, I just took the paper bag and I was so happy about it.   Every day I found this paper bag at the same place with fresh vegetables and all that we needed for home. This became my daily routine. I was eating and sharing this food with my wife and kids. I was wondering who this fool could be?! To forget his paper bag full of fresh food every day.   One day there was a big problem in the villa and I was told that my boss has died. There were too many guests coming to the villa that day and I didn't get any food that day, so I thought that one of the guests must have taken it. But the same thing happened the 2nd day, the 3rd day and the 4th day. It went on like this for a few weeks and I found it difficult to provide food for my family, so I decided to ask the wife of my boss for a raise in my salary or else I would quit my job as a watchman.   After I told her, she was shocked, and asked me, how come u never complained about your salary for the last 2 years? And why is this salary not enough for you now?! I gave her so many excuses but she was never convinced! Finally in the end, I decided to tell her the truth, I told her the entire story of the bag of groceries and as to how it was my daily provision… She then asked me as to when this stopped? I told her after the death of her husband. And then I realized that I stopped seeing the paper bag immediately after the death of my boss.   Why didn't I ever think of this before? That it was my boss who was providing this for me? I guess it was because I never thought that a person who never replied to my greetings could ever be this generous! His wife started to cry and I told her to please stop crying and that I'm really sorry that I asked for a raise, I didn't know that it was your husband who was providing me with the meals, I will remain as a watchman and be happy to provide my service.   His wife told me, I'm crying because I've finally found the 7th person my husband was giving this bag full of food. I knew my husband was giving 7 people every day, I had already found the 6 people, and all these days I was searching for the 7thperson. And today I found out.   From that day onwards, I started to receive the bag full of food again, but this time his son was bringing it to my house and giving it to my hand. But whenever I thanked him, he never replied! Just like his dad! One day, I told him THANK YOU in a very loud voice! He replied back to me to please not be offended when he doesn't reply, because he has a hearing problem, just like his dad!   As humans, we all have judged another person without knowing the real story behind their actions. So the next time you judge, please pause a moment and question if there’s any other explanation.

Attitude of Negotiation

A Father Left 17 Camels as an Asset for his 3 Sons.

When the Father passed away, his sons opened up the will.

The Will of the Father stated that the Eldest Son should get half of 17 Camels,

The Middle Son should be given 1/3rd of 17 Camels

The youngest should be given 1/9th of 17 Camels

As it's not possible to divide 17 into half or 17 by 3 or 17 by 9, the Sons started to fight with each other.

So they decided to go to a wise man.

The Wise Man listened patiently about the will, gave a thought and brought one Camel of his own and added to 17 which made the count now as 18 Camels.

Now he started sharing the Camels according to the Father's will...

Half of 18 = 9 , which will go to the Elder Son

1/3rd of 18 = 6 , which will go to the middle son.

1/9th of 18 = 2 which will go to youngest son.

Now adding this up 9+6+2 = 17 and this leaves 1 Camel which the wise man took back.

Moral :

The Attitude of Negotiation & Problem solving is to find the 18th Camel i.e. common ground. Once that is done Issue is resolved even though it's difficult at times.

Always the first step is to believe there will a solution and the rest will follow.