Tomorrow is uncertain

People plan for tomorrow, and live this moment in the hope that tomorrow will be better, it will bring pleasures and blessings.

But nobody has been able to peep into the age-old illusion of “tomorrow”. For when this “tomorrow” comes , it always comes as today. Nobody has been able to meet this myth called tomorrow.

This wisdom is encapsulated in the following Chinese story. The Chinese are the great storytellers and condense the experience of life in a small anecdote or a story. The truth reaches straight home because the story is a painting in words. It depicts the truth effectively.

Osho loves to tell this story, as he is also a master storyteller.
A king became very angry with his prime minister for certain reasons, and he sentenced him to death. It was the custom of that country that whenever a person was going to be crucified, the king himself used to come and see him. So the king came in the morning on his beautiful horse. The king came in, and the prime minister started crying.

He said to the king, “When I was young I lived with an alchemist. I learned from him the art of teaching a horse to fly. But only a certain kind of horse can be taught. I have been looking for that special kind of horse my whole life  and today you have brought the horse!  I am crying because my long apprenticeship with the alchemist, has gone in vain!”

The king became very enchanted with the idea that the horse could fly. If it were possible then he would be the only king in the whole world whose horse could fly! He said: “How long will it take to teach the horse?” The man said: “Only one year.”

In reply, the king said: “Okay, I give you one year! If you can teach the horse to fly, not only will you be released from this death sentence but you will also get half my kingdom. And if the horse cannot fly, after one year you will be killed.”

The prime minister took the horse and went home. His family asked, “What has happened? Have you escaped from the prison?” The prime minister told the whole story. The wife said: “I know that this is false. You don’t know any art and you have never been an apprentice to any alchemist.”

The prime minister said: “Anything can happen in one year. The king may die, I may die, or the horse may learn to fly! Everything is possible.”
And the end of the story is unbelievable: all three of them died in one year!