The Hermit And The Thief

Life is sometimes very challenging. Are there ways to still find happiness and peace when others try to rob us of our joy in life? Come explore in this new episode of the Happiness Podcast.

(Please note, this is a lecture, not a guided meditation.)

Transcript

Welcome to the Happiness Podcast.

I'm Dr.

Robert Puff.

Many years ago,

I heard this story.

I'm not sure where,

But it's a story filled with potential for finding happiness,

Even in the face of tragedy in our lives.

I've entitled it,

The Hermit and the Thief.

And here's what happens.

There once was a hermit who lived by himself,

Which is actually the definition of a hermit.

It's a person who chooses,

For spiritual reasons,

To live by themselves and get closer to God by being alone with God.

Well,

In this story,

This hermit lived out in the wilderness in a small cabin.

And because he really didn't own anything of value,

He didn't lock his doors and just spent much of the time in silence,

Often meditating.

So one night,

A robber came to steal from him because he saw the cabin,

Said,

Oh,

I bet I can get things from this cabin and no one is around to hear me.

Because the cabin was very isolated and he didn't see anyone coming and going.

Well,

When he snuck in,

The monk was meditating,

But it was dark,

So the robber knocked over a table and things came crashing down.

Well,

It startled the monk,

So he stood up and it also startled the robber.

And he was frightened,

So he grabbed the knife that he concealed underneath his cloak and went up to the hermit and stabbed him in the stomach.

Well,

The hermit was in great pain and he knew that he was dying,

But he put his hands on the robber's shoulders and he said,

Looking him straight in the eyes,

I see you,

God,

You can't fool me.

And then he died peacefully.

This is actually one of my favorite stories about happiness.

And if you have no belief in God whatsoever,

That really won't be that relevant to this podcast.

So please,

If you don't mind,

Hang in there to the end and see if you too might gain some insights on how to live a happy life from the story.

So what are the lessons in this story that we can learn from in order to find happiness in our lives?

Well,

Let's start with first the thief,

Because during our lives,

We may and most likely will have an encounter with a thief in our life.

And when that knife is sticking at us,

We're going to have some choices.

And the way that we respond to that knife that has been stuck into us is going to determine how our lives are going to go forward.

Because in life,

We do sometimes metaphorically get stabbed in the stomach.

As a child,

We may have had a relative that was abusive,

Sometimes sexually,

Sometimes physically,

Sometimes emotionally.

And growing up,

We got stabbed many times.

Others of us will have found our soulmate,

The person that we want to spend our lives with,

And our soul perfectly matched.

And someday we come home and some things change.

Perhaps they've left,

Perhaps they've died,

And we feel the knife sticking in us.

Or maybe we've been quietly living our lives as a hermit,

And things are going well,

And we're very peaceful.

And we get a bump somewhere in our body that we feel.

We go to the doctor,

And the doctor tells us that we have terminal cancer and have three months to live.

That knife is sticking in us.

But most of the time,

It's minor.

It's not as big as these events,

But it can still feel like the knife sticking in us.

We could be heading to work,

And we have an important meeting to get to,

Or coming home to pick up our child from child care.

And there's a horrible accident,

And we are sitting on the freeway,

And we're going to be late,

And there's going to be consequences.

Or we're like most people in the world,

Getting by,

But not with a lot left over.

And then something happens,

And a bill comes that we just can't pay,

And we don't know what we're going to do,

And it's very hard on us.

And the knife is sticking in us again.

So,

It's easy to find examples of knives sticking in us from the thief.

Now,

The question to ask ourselves is,

How do we find,

Even when this happens to us,

The peace and the happiness that can still be there,

No matter what?

Well,

Now let's visit the hermit.

What did he do?

He did things to make his life peaceful.

He meditated.

He simplified his life.

He spent time in nature,

And these were really beautiful things that he did,

And it created a peace and a happiness in him.

But even with all these efforts,

The thief came and stabbed him in the stomach,

And he knew his end was coming.

But because of his belief system,

He believed that everything that happened in life was ultimately divinely planned,

And that God had a reason and a timing for everything.

So when the thief stuck the knife in his stomach,

He realized that ultimately,

The hand behind that knife was God's hand.

And though the thief was,

Yes,

Doing something wrong,

That God knew and he knew it was his time to go home and leave this world.

Now,

I completely understand that some of you may not believe this at all.

There's no proof.

He could be delusional,

And he may just be sitting in his grave rotting for eternity.

But the point is,

As we go through life,

Sometimes we're going to get cut,

And sometimes we're going to get stabbed in the stomach,

And sometimes it's going to be so severe,

It's going to have major consequences on the way we live our life.

And of course,

We're going to do things to keep ourselves safe.

We're going to protect ourselves.

We're going to guard ourselves.

We're going to have our doors locked.

Many things we're going to do to make sure that we're safe.

But we all know,

If we've lived long enough,

Sometimes that thief still gets in,

And we get stabbed right in the stomach.

It's very tragic when it happens.

It's very sad when it happens.

And it doesn't seem fair.

All these things are natural responses to getting stabbed,

Metaphorically,

In the stomach.

But the key is,

After that knife is in it,

And we know there's consequences to this knife,

How are we going to live,

Whether we have a few breaths left,

Or we have a lifetime to live with this cut in our stomach right now?

How are we going to live well,

Even when we get stabbed?

Well,

When we do get stabbed,

Mostly in life,

It is treatable.

There are things that we can do to heal that wound,

To make sure it doesn't turn into an infection,

And to get better.

Now,

This is a metaphor for life again.

So this would be,

For example,

Let's say we lose our job.

That's us getting stabbed in the stomach.

So we may get involved in a support group of people that are unemployed and looking for work.

We may beef up our LinkedIn profile and reach out to people.

We may do lots of things to make sure that that stabbing,

That loss of the job we learn from,

But we don't let it destroy our lives.

I know that may seem a little extreme,

But let's think of an extreme case.

There are people in life that go through life and sometimes something really awful happens to them,

Like a rape.

That's a very horrible thing when someone rapes another person.

And I've worked with many people who have gone through that experience.

And we have two choices,

Really,

When this happens.

We can do nothing and be in pain and say this is wrong.

And because it's so horrible,

We may turn towards addiction to numb it.

That's like pouring alcohol in our wound or putting painkillers into the knife wound and saying,

I want that pain to go away and it's doing nothing to treat it.

We need to do things like get into counseling,

Get help.

And then we need to say,

OK,

This has cut me.

How am I going to make sure that I still live a beautiful life and don't numb myself for the rest of my life?

Because we do that a lot of times when horrible things happen,

Like a rape,

We may spend the rest of our life reliving that tragedy.

Or we may say,

No,

I'm not going to let this event destroy my life.

I'm going to see that I can turn this into something that makes my life even better.

Often in life,

What happens is when tragedy hits,

When the knife gets stuck in our stomach,

There's always a way of seeing it and turning it into something beautiful.

We resist that because we feel it just shouldn't have happened.

It's wrong.

It's not right.

And those are all true.

But nonetheless,

That knife wound is still in us.

And we can decide to let that wound get infected and truly,

Slowly eat away at us.

Or we can heal it through getting into therapy,

Reaching out to people,

Getting better.

Let it turn to a scar and then become beautiful again.

And in the long run,

It's all going to be about how we interpret it.

We can interpret it as something we can grow from,

Something we can learn from,

Something we can do to empower us to perhaps help others or make the world a better place through this tragedy in our own lives.

Or we can let it embitter us.

We can become angry.

And not that these emotions are wrong,

But if we don't move forward and say,

OK,

I've spent time being angry.

I've spent time being bitter.

I've even spent time being sad.

Now it's time to live my life.

Because a lot of people,

Unfortunately,

When they get the knife stuck in them,

They do let it slowly kill them instead of saying,

You know,

I don't know why this happened,

But I am not going to let it rob me anymore.

And I'm going to have a beautiful life no matter what that thief did to me.

And with that empowerment,

And when that belief system kicks in,

And we really work towards finding ways to making this knife into something that isn't bad.

The monk,

Through divine providence,

Felt that God was truly in control and that no one could hurt him without God's permission.

So when the knife was stuck in him,

He knew ultimately,

Even though the thief was doing something wrong,

That God ultimately was in control.

That is an extreme form of reinterpreting things.

And we don't have to do that.

But there are always ways of turning the tragedy that has happened to us into something that makes our life better and perhaps even beautiful.

We don't have to let tragedies destroy us.

It's a lot of work,

The path I'm describing,

I know that.

Because sometimes it's hard when that knife is in us.

It just really hurts.

I think just by telling people that,

It really hurts,

Can be super helpful.

But,

We have to pull it out,

We have to clean that wound,

We have to let it turn to a scar,

And we have to go on.

We have to find meaning and purpose in life.

And not let that event destroy us.

And that's what this podcast is all about.

We sometimes get stabbed.

It's true.

But there are ways of finding purpose.

The monk found purpose through divine providence.

That is a way.

It may be something that you embrace.

But there are other things we can do.

We can say,

What can I learn from this?

How can I grow from this?

How can I help others?

There's so many different ways of interpreting bad knife cuts.

There are just ways we can see it and make it into something beautiful.

There just always is a way.

So our mission,

Our goal in life,

Is to find what works for us.

We may not ever embrace divine providence.

Ever.

We may think that's utterly ludicrous.

But there's so many other things we can do.

And our mission,

I believe in life,

Is to find the solution to the knife cut.

To heal it.

And then create a beautiful life for ourselves.

To learn,

To grow,

And say,

Thief,

You're not robbing one extra minute of my life ever again.

I'm going to live my life well to my dying breath.

And we can all do this.

It is possible.

As long as one person in the planet has gone through what we're going through right now and doing well,

Then it's a possibility.

Period.

And I can tell you,

No matter how hard our lives get,

There are people that have had it harder than us,

And have turned out well,

And are doing well,

And are living happy,

Beautiful lives.

This is not an easy path.

And many of us choose not to do it because it's hard.

It's easier just to stay bitter.

I know that sounds funny,

But it is.

Just stay bitter,

Or,

Perhaps more likely,

We just numb ourselves.

We turn towards addictions,

So we don't have to feel it anymore.

But addictions have a lot of consequences to them.

And in the long run,

I believe it's better to heal and find purpose and meaning,

Even in the tragedies of life.

So at this point,

You may want to turn the podcast off,

Because I'm going to talk a little bit about the monk's experience.

And you definitely don't have to agree with it,

But I do want to talk about it,

Because I think it is a beautiful way to see life.

If there is,

Perhaps,

A purpose to life,

Which I believe there is,

Then when things happen,

Ultimately,

Ultimately,

The universe,

God,

Has got to be in control.

There has to be a reason when really hard things happen.

And if we believe that to the core of our being,

Then when those things happen,

We're going to be okay.

Again,

It is a belief system,

And those of us who believe that may just rot in our graves,

But up to getting to our graves,

Maybe we're deluding ourselves.

But we're going to be happy,

Because this belief system,

Truly believing that life has a purpose,

That there is ultimate meaning,

That love is a cornerstone of life.

And our job,

When we get stabbed,

Is to love back,

Always,

Unconditionally.

And if we do that well,

I believe when tragedy hits,

We'll feel joy in our hearts,

And find peace,

No matter what.

I know some of you listening to this podcast right now are going through really hard times,

I know that.

But,

Perhaps,

Perhaps today,

We can say,

Okay,

I don't know why I'm going through this,

I may never know,

Until I die and am facing God.

But part of me is going to believe that even when the darkest thing happens to me,

There could still be a reason for it,

And God's hand could be behind it.

And it is possible that I can turn this into something beautiful.

Thank you for joining me on the Happiness Podcast.

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That's happinesspodcast.

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And until next time,

Accept what is,

Love what is.

Reviews

Excellent talk. Thank you! 🙏🏻

Thank you, dear Dr. Puff. All of your podcasts are so inspiring. I appreciate you.

Dr. Puff is such a wonderful teacher. He has the kindest, and most soothing voice. He is very empathetic and has impeccable skills in describing some of the toughest things in life. I thoroughly enjoy his podcasts.

A nice change ! 🙏💯

Thank you very much 🙏