The Mad Gardener :: heard in the Art of Living Ashram in Bangalore

At The Art of Living ashram in Bangalore this beautiful meditation hall is visited by thousands of people from all over the world. I have been there a couple of times and can think of no better place to go for some days of deep rest and redisovering what it feels like to be free of stress and to nurture my mind and soul with wisdom and meditations and singing and meeting friends from all over the world.

And - to hear ancient stories of wisdom. Here's one that I hope you'll enjoy.

"In the outskirts of a village there was a beautiful garden with abundant fruit trees and flowers of outstanding beauty and fragance. This garden was surrounded by a strong fence and in the middle of the garden on a high hill the owner of the garden would be sitting all day long. The gardener would call out at the top of his lungs to anyone who passed by,

"Come, Come, Come and taste my delicious fruits. Come, come, come - I would love to give this away for free. Just come to the gate and I will give you anything you wish".

The bypassers would be happy that this man would share all the riches of the garden and they would approach the gate. But as the gardener descended the hill and walked towards the gate, suddenly he would grab a heavy branch of a tree and whirl it over his head as a weapon to attack the bypassers and he would start shouting at them,

"Go away! Don't come one step closer. What makes you think I would share any of these riches with you! Go away and don't dare to come back!".

And people would consider the gardener as a mad man and quickly leave.

As time passed everyone knew about the mad gardener and people no longer approached the gates of beautiful garden though trees were abundant with fruits and though flowers would spread their inviting fragance. After some years, the mad gardener passed away and the villagers decided to remove the hill and make the garden an open field for the benefit of all the villagers. As they started to dig into the hill, a golden chair appeared from the earth.

The garden had once been the land of a good hearted king and the golden chair had been his throne. That is why the gardener would behave like the king when he sat on the top of the hill, calling out to all bypassers to share his riches and wanting to do good. and that is why when he stepped down from the hill and thus down from the throne, that he became greedy and egoistic, wanting to keep all the riches to himself.".