08 Dec Magical mustard seeds
Here is a famous but sad story from the Buddhist tradition called the story of the mustard seeds.
A woman named Kisa Gotami lost her only child but mad with grief she refused to accept her child was dead. She went to every doctor and healer and begged them to save her child. They all told her that her child had died and was beyond help.
Finally she went to the Buddha for help. He told her he could help. All she had to do was bring him some mustard seeds. She was delighted as mustard seeds were very common and easy to acquire. The Buddha added however that the seeds must come from a household in which no one had experienced the death of a loved one.
She desperately went from house to house, but to her disappointment, she could not find a house that had not suffered at the hands of death. She listened as person after person told their own stories of loss and grief over loved ones. After hearing about so many other peoples grief and seeing how common her experience was, she finally accepted her child’s death. She buried her dead child and went back to the Buddha and became a Buddhist nun.
When we experience pain and sadness we often think why me, why am I cursed. We feel like we are the only ones who are suffering and then we isolate ourselves from everyone else which only makes things worse. When we fight against this instinct to isolate ourselves we see that everyone around us is also suffering and that we all in the same boat. We are reminded of our humanity and our common shared experiences. We no longer feel weak, isolated and alone. It gives us the strength to face reality and carry on.
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