Once, a man visited a wise teacher, who lived beside a river. The river was broad and deep. There were no bridges near there. The man wished to cross the river, so he asked the teacher for his advice.
“Travel east for sixteen days. There is a bridge which will allow you to cross.”
Hearing this, the man was unsatisfied.
”But you’re supposed to be a wise teacher! Surely you know of a better way?”
The teacher shook his head.
The man left the next morning, heading east.
Three hours later, he was tired of the biting flies and the burning sun. He saw a man sitting by the river – the only one he had seen since leaving the wise teacher. He stopped and introduced himself.
The sitting man was young and vigorous. He nodded sympathetically as the traveller explained his plight.
“You’re in luck. For a small fee, I can teach you to walk on water.”
The traveller did not believe him.
“No, look.” The sitting man pointed to a house across the river. “That’s where I live, over there. If I can’t walk on water, how do you think I get home each day?”
The traveller looked about. There was no boat, no bridge and no ford. Maybe this guy is legit, he mused.
He paid the man, who meditated with him, then promised that he would be able to walk on water once he awoke.
The next day, the traveller woke to find the man was gone, along with all his money and belongings. Worse still, he stepped experimentally onto the water and his foot sank up to the knee.
He never did cross the river.
Motivation isn’t some weird mental technique you can acquire. It’s a simple thing.
- You want something, or you don’t want it.
- You want it because of something inside you, or something outside of you.
If you can’t appreciate the simplicity of this, you may never cross the river. Here’s a simple video I made for people who want to understand the dynamics of motivation.
