Thinking Out of the Box?

There was a man who had worked all of his life, had saved all of his money, and was a real miser when it came to his money.

Just before he died, he said to his wife,

"When I die, I want you to take all my money and put it in the casket with me. I want to take my money to the afterlife with me."

And so he got his wife to promise him with all of her heart that when he died, she would put all of the money in the casket with him. Well,he died.

He was stretched out in the casket, his wife was sitting there in black, and her friend was sitting next to her.

When they finished the ceremony, just before the undertakers gotready ! to close the casket, the wife said, "Wait just a minute!"

She had a box with her; she came over with the box and put it in the casket. Then the undertakers locked the casket down, and they rolled it away.

So her friend said, "Girl, I know you weren't fool enough to put all that money in there with your husband."

The loyal wife replied, "Listen, I'm a Christian, I can't go back on my word. I promised him that I was going to put that money in that casket with him."

"You mean to tell me you put that money in the casket with him!!!!?"

"I sure did," said the wife. "I got it all together, put it into my account and wrote him a cheque.

If he can cash it, he can spend it!"

Monkey Business

Once upon a time in a village, a man appeared and announced to the villagers that he would buy monkeys for Rs10.

The villagers seeing that there were many monkeys around, went out to the forest and started catching them.

The man bought thousands at Rs.10 and as supply started to diminish, the villagers stopped their effort. He further announced that he would now buyat Rs.20. This renewed the efforts of the villagers and they started catching monkeys again.

Soon the supply diminished even further and people started going back to their farms. The offer rate increased to Rs.25 and the supply of monkeys became so little that it was an effort to even see a monkey, let alone catch it!

The man now announced that he would buy monkeys at Rs50! However, since he had to go to the city on some business, his assistant would now buy onbehalf of him.

In the absence of the man, the assistant told thevillagers. Look at all these monkeys in the big cage that the man has collected. I will sell them to you at Rs35 and when the man returns from the city, you can sell it tohim for Rs.50."

The villagers squeezed up with all their savings and bought all the monkeys.

Then they never saw the man nor his assistant, only monkeys everywhere!! !

Welcome to the "Stock" Market!!!!!

Ripples

A man was sitting by a lake. He was throwing small pebbles into it from time to time. A young boy happened to cross by. He was intrigued to see that after every few minutes or so, the man would toss a pebble into the lake.

The boy went up to the man and said, "Good pastime, this stone throwing, he?" "Hmmm," said the man. He seemed to be deep in thought and obviously did not wish to be disturbed.

Sometime later, the man said softly, "Look at the water, it is absolutely still."

The boy said, "Yeah, it is."

The man tossed a pebble into the water and continued, "Only till I toss a pebble into it now do you see the ripples?"

"Yeah," said the boy, "they spread further and further."

"And soon, the water is still again," offered the man.

The boy said, "Sure, it becomes quiet, after a while."

The man continued, "What if we want to stop the ripples? The root cause of the ripples is the stone. Let's take the stone out. Go ahead and look for it." The boy put his hand into the water and tried to take the stone out.

But he only succeeded in making more ripples. He was able to take the stone out, but the number of ripples that were made in the process were a lot more than before.

The wise man said, "It is not possible to stop the movement of the water once a pebble has been thrown into it. But if we can stop ourselves from throwing the pebble in the first place, the ripples can be avoided altogether! So too, it is with our minds. If a thought enters into it, it creates ripples. The only way to save the mind from getting disturbed is to block and ban the entry of every superfluous thought that could be a potential cause for disturbance. If a disturbance has entered into the mind, it will take its own time to die down. Too many conflicting thoughts just cause more and more disturbances. Once the disturbance has been caused it takes time to ebb out. Even trying to forcibly remove the thought may further increase the turmoil in the mind. Time surely is a great healer, but prevention is always better than cure."

Before you allow a thought or a piece of information to enter your mind, put it through the triple filter test of authenticity, goodness and value.

-Author Unknown-

A Bird's Eye

Shooting A Bird’s Eye

An ancient Indian sage was teaching his disciples the art of archery. He put a wooden bird as the target and asked them to aim at the eye of the bird.

The first disciple was asked to describe what he saw. He said, “I see the trees, the branches, the leaves, the sky, the bird and its eye.”

The sage asked this disciple to wait. Then he asked the second disciple the same question.

He replied, “I only see the eye of the bird.” The sage said, “Very good, then shoot.”

The arrow went straight and hit the eye of the bird.

Unless we focus, we cannot achieve our goal. It is hard to focus and concentrate, but it is a skill that can be learned.

-Author Unknown-