Original Parable: Thrown Rocks

There was once a woman who had an absolutely terrible neighbor.  The woman next door was rude, would borrow things without asking (some people call that stealing), and would only talk to the woman when she needed something.  The nice woman would have let many of these things go and chalked them up as eccentricities if it had not been for one more incredible problem that her neighbor had.  She would throw rocks into her yard!  Not just little pebbles, but full sized rocks.  Where she got them from the woman did not know.  Every day there would be new rocks to pick up out of the yard.

At first she was very unhappy.  Why would this woman throw rocks at me?  What’s her problem?  What have I ever done to her?  This would keep her up at night.  She talked to her friends about it.  She never found an answer that would please her.

So, one particularly cloudy day she decided to start picking up the rocks and putting them to good use.  She took her focus off of her neighbor and started to dream about all the possibilities for her new, seemingly unlimited, supply of building materials.

She settled on landscaping.  She was able to make a beautiful path from her back porch to her garden.  She was very pleased with it.  She was surprised with herself.  The rocks seemed to fit perfectly together as it wound from porch to garden.  Over time she was able to transform her backyard, moved to the front yard, and then started to get to work on her friends yards as well.

People will throw rocks.  I know it sounds incredible, but it’s true.  People will throw rocks at you.  You can’t stop them and it can really hurt.  Truly, you cannot stop the rocks from coming, but you can control what you will do with the rocks.  The greatest artists (and people) in our time have figured out how to make something that caused them great pain something beautiful for themselves and for the world.