Adapt and Learn

Once upon a time, a daughter complained to her father that her life was miserable and that she didn’t know how she was going to make it through – there were just too many things happening to her and affecting her life; she was tired of fighting and struggling all the time: it seemed just as one problem was solved, another one soon followed.

Her father, who was a chef, took her into the kitchen where he filled 3 pots with water and placed each on the stove.  Once the pots began to boil, he placed potatoes in one pot, eggs in the second pot and ground coffee beans in the third.  Without saying a word to his daughter he let all the pots sit and boil.
 
His daughter moaned and waited impatiently until, after 20 minutes, he turned off the stove and placed the potatoes and eggs in 2 bowls and the coffee in to a cup.  Turning to his daughter he asked, “What do you see?”  “Potatoes, eggs and coffee”, she replied.

 “Look closer”, he responded, “and touch the potatoes”.  She did so and found that they were soft.  “Now take an egg and break open the shell”, said her father.  After doing so, she found the eggs were hard-boiled beneath their shell.  Finally, he asked her to sip the coffee and its rich aroma and taste brought a smile to her face.
 

“Dad, I don’t understand what this means”, she told her father.

The chef then explained, “The potatoes, eggs and coffee beans all faced the same adversity as each other – the boiling water – but each reacted differently: the potatoes changed from being strong and hard to soft and weak; the eggs contained a soft liquid inside their fragile shells but became hard; but the coffee beans were unique – they changed the water itself and created something new.  Which one are you? When you are presented with difficulties and challenges, how do you respond to them? Do you allow the situation to change you and push you away from what you want to be or achieve, or do you take the opportunity to use events to the best advantage you can make from them?”
 

How do you view the events in your life and face the challenges you are presented? Are you a potato, an egg or a coffee bean?
 

Life is all about learning, adapting and making all of our experiences – both good and bad – into something positive.

Adapted from a story by unknown author at http://funnnyfunny.com/struggles-of-our-life/