A tree is tough but not conceited......
by Thota Srinivas
One unfortunate day, a fully grown tree was being uprooted by a heavy flood of flowing river.
The river took pity on it and said, " Perhaps, you could have stayed where you were if you had learnt to be flexible and be humble enough to bow down to forces which overpower you.
Unlike you, the grass has always been following the life skill of bending itself involuntarily to situations and powers it can not control and so it survives and sticks to where it is meant to be.
Alas! if only you had followed this in your life, things now could have been different !"
The tree, with life still lingering in it, listened to the river intently and began thus, " Did you ever try to know what it is to be a tree? And do you think we do have an easy life? A seed securing a place of comfort in the soil is a struggle in itself.
It has to fight against all the visible and invisible forces which work against its growth. And sadly this battle to survive continues until I perish completely.
Even as a plant and as a young tree I am consistently and continually assaulted. I get ripped, shredded, eaten , plucked, severed, pelted, burnt, withered, impoverished and choked ....but my life still lingers with a hope of renewal and regrowth not to thrive selfishly but to live a life of service.
I create an ecosystem to provide habitat and food for birds ,animals and even humans. I can be home to as many as 500 different species of animals and birds.I absorb carbon dioxide and potentially harmful gasses, such as sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, from the air and release oxygen without which survival of humans is impossible.
I am used as food, fuel, shelter, medicine, a study, a god and a slave. I do not care about how much I am being useful to the environment around me because I am born to give what I possess and bless all...regardless of whether they worship or exploit me..... but not to receive in pride what I don't deserve and wreck what is not meant for me.
I do not bend or bow before any force that tries to deplete my strength and cripple my integrity pushing my limits and endeavoring unfairly to pull me down because I have learnt to struggle till the last spark of my life gives up and confront all odds no matter how strong they are and stand erect in my attempt to grow and reach for the sky and thus grow majestically in silence with patience and tolerance.
Things and people who are born with abundance to bestow are naturally complicated and tough but are unjustly misunderstood, misinterpreted and misrepresented as arrogant and conceited.
Vanity paves way to destruction of self and others while being tough and strong paves way to inspiration and learning. "
By then the tree started losing its strength and could feel its approaching doom.
Finally it said in a weakening tone, " God has been so kind to me all these years and if he still feels that I am capable of giving invaluable life to the things around me, you, who have been the cause of my fall shall station me in a place where I could cling and thrive again to be useful ........else, a divine contentment of having a short but an extraordinary life of reason and purpose shall be mine unlike the feeling of leading an ordinary, long and futile life of regret and non-feasance.
A grass plant is born to bend while a tree is born to fend."