A CHEROKEE LEGEND

I am an avid note-taker.  I don’t score very high on reviewing those notes for further enlightenment, but I still have an ingrained habit of hearing something and wanting to reinforce it by writing it down at the moment.  While searching today for a particular small notebook, I opened another one and something caught my eye.  It was a Cherokee legend of a conversation between  grandfather and grandson.

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

This hit me like a slap across the head today.  In a moment of clarity, I realized I’d been feeding the wrong wolf lately.  In a time when I need to be focused more than ever on making wise and correct decisions, planning meticulously for a safe future, and doing all I can to pull from the strength within to emotionally/psychologically engage in the (what is sure to be) warfare in the days ahead, I’ve been sidetracked on lesser things.  Not unimportant things by all means, just thoughts and ideas that are not helpful to me right now at this time in my life.  I’ve always been weak in the area of moderation – time after time I’ve thrown myself 150% into something, which of course makes me negative-impactful on other parts of my life that need my attention.   My other wolf was feeding my ego, meeting an unmet need that had been in short supply for decades.   It wasn’t evil, it wasn’t bad.   There are many times when we have to choose between two good things.  Of course I craved it.  Of course I hungered for it.  But now is not the time.  This other wolf wakened many things inside me that needed to be shaken up and stirred and remembered.  And I am very, very grateful for that memory, but it isn’t helping me right now and it’s not serving me well to dwell on what could be.   I don’t need my ego stroked – I know who I am and Whose I am.   I have full faith that my missing needs will be met in a future day – I have lived long without that, I can still keep living without it – it won’t crush me.  But there is an order to everything, and I need to get my head straight.  I’m choosing to feed the wolf that will get me through the next 5 months.