Amazing stories

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Comment by Uriel on December 13, 2010 at 10:11pm

Eva,

 

Thank you for your inspirational words,

and more than that,

THANK YOU for creating and holding this space for us.

 

Bless

Uriel

Comment by Eva Libre on December 13, 2010 at 10:05pm

Some inspirational words

From the Spirit within we see the shadows of light and dark that befall the human mind. Let us not let the day end on the final note of uncaring sadness that neglect brings. Today is the day to say goodbye to negativity for good, we are good souls, rejoice in the love inside.
Friday marks the day. Don't let the day pass by without finding something to make you happy. Good news is whatever makes the heart smile for just a little while. The top of the world is where we stand if we let ourselves see good in all.
What became of the little child that was within us all. If only weariness did not set in at such an early age, if only the flesh remained as fresh as the soul. Give us not the time to worry. Give us not the time to weep. See us as we're meant to be - young and harmonious, free the Spirit within - it's who we are.
Not within these walls should the love of our hearts be confined. Not within this moment should humility be denied. Not only are we here in Spirit, we are to do the work of the Spirit and the Spirit is the energy of love. Too many times the heart is ignored, be not vested in materiality it has no value at the end. So says the white feather.

- J.Roots

Comment by Eva Libre on November 18, 2010 at 8:28pm

People come into your life for a reason

Comment by Uriel on September 23, 2010 at 2:35pm

Why should we live in peace?

Many people around the world had seen too many wars and many people die and want to put an end to it. We start to wonder if we need it, and if it is absolutely necessary for our progress and our survival.
It is known now and proven that whatever happens in our head, finds its way to our reality. "What we think about comes about." Let's looks at it from the other way around then, if we have war in our reality, then we must have war in our mind, or maybe even with our mind. If our mind is at war, then he produces war in our reality. So what is our mind in war with? Ourselves!

Most of us are living in constant struggle and inner conflict, always have two voices in our head, telling us where to go and what to do and most of us find it very hard to know which one to listen to in order to make our lives better. That creates a firm constant stress which of course affects our thinking and there for our reality. We create war, in smaller and bigger scale, just so we can find the solution through it, just so we can experience our struggle, and decide if we would like to go on or change our experience and reality of our lives. All this means that if we find a way to live in peace with ourselves, the war in our reality will be gone.

So why do we fight ourselves over and over again? Why do we keep this war within us even though it brings us so much suffering?
If you look at the things most people want the most, you most likely will find that they are not materialize things but inner experiences, beings and state of minds. Things like Happiness, Joy, Peacefulness, Calmness, Love, choose your pick, are usually in our top lists, and we all want to know for certain we will get there, and here is where the conflict begins.
We all have two voices in our head telling us what to do and where to go, let's call them for now our Mind and our Intuition, and both of them had been advocated throughout the years for why we should be listening to them and not the other. That already creates a conflict within, since they are both there and will not be going anywhere anytime soon, if ever. Even if we do choose and know which one to listen to, the other one will make our lives a living hell until we will be listening to him as well. Here's where the other conflict begins, when we do listen to them both, we are getting different and contradicting information about everything! Starting with what do we want to do in our lives and all the way to what to say and when, so how can we live in peace when we have two of the best lawyers ever created within our very selves? How do we make peace among them?

The first thing to realize about peaceful relationship is to know that the other side has the exact same right to be there as the first side. Recognizing this prevents us from accusing the other side for our problems, thinking that if they weren't there, our problem will be gone, we understand that if we have a problem, then we have something to solve. Usually what most of us do is accusing others for their problems, if we have a problem, with anything, then how come we are looking outside of us, if WE HAVE the problem? We have it; if we see it outside of us it is only for us to be conscious of it.

Now that we realized and accepted that we have two amazing voices in ourselves, and that they will be there through our entire lives, what can we do in order to know which one to listen to and when, if at all?
Let's look at them for a minute and see what each one of them is like:
1. Our Mind – Our Mind is and will ever be the best creating tool we will ever own, it sometimes needs its time in order to figure out how to create what we want him to create, but never the less, he will do it as long as we want it to, no matter how big is the order. "Whatever the Mind Can Conceive it Can Achieve." W.Clement Stone ." That is his best and main quality.
2. Our Intuition – Even from the very name of this voice, you can understand its quality. Intuition – In Tuition, Inner Teacher (Tuition – "Tuition is instruction or teaching", Wikipedia).

So now we know each one of our voice's best and main quality, there is a question to be asked: If our mind main reason for being is creating, why does it speak?

First, we have to remember that we had been accustomed to listen to our mind throughout the history. It always been said to think before you say or do something. Actually, it is true, but that thought is created from a different place other the mind, like we said, the guide, the teacher, is our intuition. Throughout the history, people felt unworthy to listen to themselves, to listen to their truth, as if our truth is wrong, and been guided by people of power to listen to them and that they will find happiness with them. It is far much easier to make people do what they are told when they are listening to their minds. Your truth is the only truth ever existed. The thing is to remember that each and every one of us has that same right, to listen and to act on their own truth.

There is another reason for our mind to speak and that is to tell us what it needs. Let's say that we ordered quite a big order and that our mind needs some time in order to create it, it might get better for the next time, but for now it needs some time and patience from us, so it tells us what he thinks about it and how long it thinks it would take to create that order, just to let us know, that's all. There is no need to start arguing with it and pushing it to make it faster, if we do, we stop recognizing its right to be as it is, remember the first thing to realize?

So we know who is our guide, the teacher, and who will create whatever we will need throughout our lives, but how do we recognize between those voices in order to know where to go and what to do in order to achieve those wonderful experiences, beings and state of minds?

It doesn't matter. Do you really think it matter if your intuition told you to leave you job or if that you mind told you that it needs some time in order to create your next experience, or maybe just the source of safety just so you can go on without that job?
It really doesn't matter, but in case you do want to know the difference, just to make you more comfortable, there is a way, a way to think, in order to listen to your intuition.

We have to remember our voice's main qualities, to guide and to create.
When our intuition guides us toward an area we had already been through and know how to create what we need, everything runs smoothly and there is no problem.
The conflict begins when we go through an area which we are unfamiliar with, and unknown area. The biggest fear of all human kind throughout the history is the unknown. If you look closely, it is the source of all our fears. Now that we know that our intuition is our guide and teacher, how do we know that we are listening to it so we can know for certain that we will be just fine, and maybe even better, when we will be after this unknown experience?

Like I said before, our intuition guides us where to go and what to do, the mind is the one, sometimes asking for a pause, or some time, in order to create what we asked for. The truth is that our mind can create, and is creating, what we want immediately, with no pauses or flaws, what takes us time, is our capacity and capability to realize it in our reality.

Here comes the step of belief into the unknown, because it is asking us to go where we had not yet been before, it is asking us to put out step down on what we yet don't know as a solid ground, because when we do, we will realize that what we asked for, what we ordered from our minds, is already there, waiting for us to come and pick it up.
Albert Einstein said: "We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." If thinking is what makes our reality, then that means that we cannot go on doing what we know and do and expect a different solution, which is Insanity, like our very same friend said.

Now, believing is to go through or against fear, otherwise, why should we gather such inner force in order to do something? And to go through or against something, is actually to put it there to begin with, otherwise we would not be going through it or against it at all. We put it there for a reason. That reason is why we are here, and usually is understood after the experience.
So like I said, believing is gathering an immense inner force which a lot of us do not know how to gather, most of us just forgot how to connect to that endless power which is within us. Why? Because we had been told throughout the history of men and women that we don't know, that we should be listening to what others has to say, especially our people in power. First it's our parents, second, our teachers, and third and on top of them all, our governments. This is not to make you go and rebel, this is to help you realize which way to go, your way, and not anybody else's.

Take an area in your life, something you've touched, observed and acted on. Observe it for a minute and ask yourselves these questions:
Do you or do you not know more today at this area, more than you did 10 years ago?
When you will be going through that area again, would you or would you not know better how to act or react to whatever happens in that specific area?
Do you know, not succeed, more about that area?

You see, most of us think that only when we succeed we prove to ourselves and to the world that we know. Why, aren't you usually getting even better from mistakes? And when you do succeed, do you really go on succeeding from that day forth?

Do you know why? Do you really want to know why we are getting better all the time?
There is only one thing which is constant and is not affected by anything and that thing is Change. You see, change is happening at all times, all the time, your very thought change by themselves, your beliefs change, your actions, your being, you change all the time.
There is nothing that we can do in order to "change" that, and there is nothing we want to do, because if change is happening all the time, and, as we just realized, if we are getting better all the time, that means that the only thing we can know for sure that had been there at all times and had a direct improving affect on us, is change!

So you can go on and be yourself and live your lives in your own terms and pace.

It's ok, You can breathe.
The change happens by itself.
And change is good.

Remind that to yourselves, Re-Mind that, and you will be able to listen to your own intuition, for the simple reason, that you already know in advance, what your mind has to say about that.

So why should we live in peace? Is there any better way?

Comment by Irit Hakim-Keller on August 9, 2010 at 8:32pm

Thia is not a story of mine - but it is an amazing one....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yfbchq0xQmQ&feature=player_embedded

Comment by Irit Hakim-Keller on August 9, 2010 at 8:30pm

Thank you all for your beautiful amazing stories.
I am still looking into my memory to find a real amazing story to tell you :):)

Comment by Uriel on August 7, 2010 at 11:31am

Hello to you all,

I don't know many stories, I just never remember them. That is why I decided at an early age to go and make my life a living story, one which will be worth telling about, if only to help anybody to realise they can live their lives more peaceful and free.
Here is how it all began....

The Beginning of My Journey

It was when I was 16 years old, three months after I quit school, I moved to an art school, something I thought would be more free and without binding or obligating tasks. I came back from a visit in the U.S. and my hopes were shattered.
When I was in the United States, I discovered a world of unlimited possibilities, and here I am returning to school and realizing I need to present certain school work in order to continue in my studies. I got depressed. Must I really need to do something in order to continue being there? Must I really need to do something in order for me to continue being anywhere?!
It was a period of two weeks, the hardest two weeks I have ever gone through, two weeks in which I simply wanted to die.
At the end of that period, after long phone calls with a very good friend, I started coming out of it, into a decision which was about to change my life forever.

One day, I went to visit another good friend who was living at the time in the same building I was living in. At the end of the visit, while I was going through the books she had, I noticed a little orange book, which for some reason drew my attention, so without thinking twice, I took it from the shelf and after checking if it was ok with her, took it with me to my place.
I remember clearly, how I read it in two parts, and after finishing the second part, I fell asleep. When I woke up, I opened it and started reading it from the beginning, something which happened 5-6 times at that same week alone.
The book threw me into places I never even dared to think of. It made me think of freedom, daring and doing and fulfilling my destiny in this world, something I never even thought existed until that time. I started thinking again, and learning without end.
At that day I came to a decision: I, from this day forth, am doing only whatever it is I feel like, learning, doing and choosing my life as I and only I wish to, even if it will bring me to my death.

5 years later…

I was already finished with the army and another year in which I worked in the kibbutz (where I lived) and thought about where I would like to fly to. There was no doubt in my mind: Spain. Spain and Morocco, into the Sahara.
It's been 5 years. All I could think about was how it would be on that castle in Tarifa, how Tangier and Morocco would be, and how it would be to cross the Sahara.

I had just broken up with my Dutch girlfriend after being with her for a year and half. We broke up over the phone, and I thought it would be wise for me to fly to her first, so we could break up energetically, face to face. I bought a one way ticket to Amsterdam and went to her to say my last goodbye.
Only a few days after I came to her, it was very obvious we'd grown apart and that our mutual way of life had ended. For some reason she told me she thought I should go to Barcelona, It was exactly what I thought and on the next day I was on my way.

Things around me started going amazingly and after two weeks I found myself in Ibiza in a farm where I lived for three months. Amazing things happened there and I learned a lot about myself, about the world and about few of my abilities. About one of these experiences I would like to go into detail since it was one of most exciting experiences which to this day takes a heartbeat from me when I think about it.

It was just another normal evening. I don't remember why but I was angry. I went to the surface which was just above my room. It was just after sunset and, looking to the skies, I saw a few clouds and beautiful skies, but being so angry, I started shouting to the skies and God: "If you're so big, let's see you!" I continued shouting like this for a while until I released all my anger. When I calmed down, I looked and saw that there were three pine trees, close in front of me.
They were quite young, but the middle one seemed a bit older since it was bigger than the other two, standing proud over the two on either side.
I was reminded of the book "Illusions" by Richard Bach, which I read two or three years earlier, and decided to try it. I closed my eyes and imagined that there are only two trees in front of me, the two on both sides, and that the third one, the middle one, doesn't exist. I saw with the eyes of my spirit, the view behind it, as if it wasn't there. I stood that way with my eyes closed, imagining for few minutes and then went on my way, back to my friend at the farm, and forgot all about it.
I don't remember when, but after a while rain started falling, and then some more rain, and slowly, slowly a serious storm stared, what caused electrical problems and a long electrical shut down occurred, going back and forth.
4 hours after I left the trees, we went to sleep and because the chimney of the heater in my room gave me, and the girl who was with me at the time, trouble, filling my room with smoke, we decided to go to sleep at her room. Just before we went to sleep, I told her I would just go and fix the chimney so the smoke would go out through the night.
I went to the chimney above the room, fixed it, and started going back to the room, which meant going next to the same place where I stood in front of the trees just a few hours earlier. It was pitch black dark and my flashlight, which was pointed to the ground, pointed suddenly at branches of a live tree. It was weird seeing live branches lying on the ground so I pointed the flashlight upwards to see what I was looking at. Even Now, 8 years later, I still have those same shivers I had back then when I understood that what I was lighting was the same tree I imagined being gone, lying on the ground, while the other two trees stood proudly, like nothing happened. I went into a shock and ran scared from what I came to realize. It turned out, on the next day, that what happened that night was the worst storm Ibiza had and experienced in the 20th century, a storm which destroyed a few places on the island. Trees fell all over the island. A beach I visited a lot, which had been full of sand, was only rocks without a grain of sand to show what was there before. A building which held a business on another beach, was destroyed completely and there wasn't a brick standing on a brick to show there had been any building there at all. I didn't know what to do with myself, but I did understand one thing, and that is that there are tremendous powers in me and that I should be careful with my thoughts.

And to the rest of the journey…

About a month after that storm, someone who was on the farm told me two of her friends were then in Tariff and that she wants to go to them. I told her right then and there: "If you're going, I'm joining you!" A week later, we were on our way.
It was a journey full of magic and wonders, and two to three days later we were in Tariff.
We lived together with her two friends in a bungalow for two weeks which I walked around, celebrated Christmas - although I'm Jewish, and added more wonders to the journey, but more than anything, I remember a moment when I sat on an old wall, almost familiar, and looked south, to Africa. I remember the moment as if it was today, the excitement, the thrill of a dream coming true, no words to be said, just peace and quiet.
And so two weeks went by until a sign came to go on with the journey…

It turned out, that on the day after the New Year's Eve, while I was celebrating in Tariff with friends I'd met, a nomad came into our house and started talking to my friends. He came again the next evening, and no longer than half an hour later, we decided we were going together to Morocco, and to be more precise, Marrakesh.
We looked for someone with a caravan who would be going in the same direction but didn't find one. Two days after we met, we took the ferry on our own to Tangier and on the same night continued on a train to Marrakesh. My friend on the journey had very little money and I even helped him with the train ticket to Marrakesh. This is how I entered another world and a huge lesson and experience which I was to receive when I really needed it and to trust the that world will give me whatever I will ever need.
When we arrived in Marrakesh, I decided that although I had $1,000 in my pocket, I acted as if I had no money and learned another thing from the little master. The guy was from France and from the beginning we decided he would be my translator. Another thing was that I was very much afraid being an Israeli in Morocco at that time, time when buses were bombed in Israel weekly, and not long before, two men were lynched in Israel, so I had my share of fears, and he said yes to my request, that he tell everyone I was from Canada, something no one there could deny since my English misleads even Canadians. After walking around for a day in Marrakesh and sleeping in a young guy's place, a guy we'd met in the street, we got up in the morning when the French guy was impatient to go on. I persuaded him to take me along and got him to come with me toward the desert. We started hitchhiking and even hitchhiked with a paying bus, and to this day I don't understand how it was possible. We went on and on, passed through a major city called Ourzazat, and kept on hitchhiking south into what they called a Wadi. It's a channel, a road, around which are endless villages. We got into a small and relatively central town in the middle of the night and a guy we met in the street offered to let us sleep in his hair dresser shop and in the next morning even brought us food. I was amazed at all abundance flowing toward me and stayed silent just to keep on learning and because almost no one spoke English.
We kept on hitchhiking and around noon arrived at a tent of the last person who picked us up hitchhiking, where they hosted us in the most beautiful way, offering us food and a place to stay without even asking us who we are and us offering money. We stayed there for a few days. We use the time to hike around in the desert, to the village nearby, watching and observing the surroundings. Those were amazing days, days of pure silence.
After those days, in one of our trips to the nearby village, an offer came for a donkey hike further into the desert. It turned out it was a business who hosted us and after letting my friend join me without any payment, I agreed.
We went on a one to two-hour hike and arrived at a tent camp, where different businesses of camels and donkeys trips were parking and kept their guests for the nights. We were suppose to go on a trip or a hike every day and to come back to sleep in the tent but at the end we just stayed in the tent, not feeling any urge to go anywhere.
Those were 9 days, since Marrakesh, I found myself not looking for a shower, even though I had all the possibilities, including filling up a black plastic 5 liter water tank and letting it hit up in the desert sun, again, I just didn't feel the urge to do it.
In one of those nights the French man and I went for a walk on the dunes which were next to the camp. After going up and down for half an hour or so, we heard a drum banging from far off. Looking to the direction of the sound, we saw a light and decided to go and check out the source of the sound. We arrived at a tent far away from the camp and noticed amazingly beautiful music coming close, until we arrived at the opening of the tent. Inside we saw two couples of men walking around in a small circle, each one of them holding an instrument, if you can call it such. It was some kind of a music producing piece of something, and they sang couple to couple, couple sings, a couple answers. We stood there in the opening of the tent, amazed at the beauty and the simplicity of the music which they created with such simple instruments and their voices alone. At that time we also noticed another guy sleeping on our left, probably enjoying the music just as we did. When they finished playing, we just started clapping our hands, which caused them finally to notice us.
They immediately invited us inside the tent and we told them it was amazing watching and hearing them. They thanked us and one of them went straightaway to make us some tea. I remember I immediately felt much more comfortable with them than I had felt until then. I don't remember exactly, they might even have spoken English. When the guy with the tea came back, I had the best Shiba (Wormwood) tea I have ever had in my life, and I never even liked this tea. When the French man asked which tea it was, I answered naturally: Shiba. It brought a huge smile to our host's faces, and they asked me: "Where do you know this tea from?"
I stuttered something. All I could think of was that nobody could know I was from Israel. In such a distant place, I could be murdered and no one would ever know, let alone find me.
The lie hurt me.
How could I lie to such good people who hosted me with such joy and love and gave me the most welcome feeling? How?

When we came back to our tent, the owner of the business we were hosted by came to visit and asked after our well-being and where we were from. When the French man started answering the usual answer about me being from Canada, I stopped him. I could not lie anymore, I just couldn't.
I told the business owner where I was from and why I had lied until then. His answer left me with an open mouth. Not only did he understand me and say that the secret would stay safe with him, he also told me that the band "Sheva" (The word "Sheva" means seven and there used to be a band with that name in Israel, playing Ethnic music) were in that exact place and filmed a video clip and they became really good friends, and on the next day he played a cassette of Yehoram Gaon (An Israeli singer) in his car. And all that was in the middle of the desert.
He told me that the place is called "The dune of the Jew" because when the caravans were coming from the desert, the Jews would go to meet them outside of the villages to buy cheap and to sell in profit back in the villages. At that same place one of those Jews was murdered and buried.

But enough with the stories, I came out there to cross the Sahara…

Well, when I asked about the Sahara in the first tent, I was told I would need a camel, a guide and food for all of us. By calculation for the 6 months I would need to cross the desert, which I was told is what it would take, I would need $35,000. Another thing was that the ground border between Morocco and Algiers was closed at that time because of a civil war going on in Algiers.
When we came to the camp, our hosts pointed at the mountains in front of us and told me: "You see there, this is the beginning of the Sahara." It was 40km alone from the border between Morocco and Algiers.
Oh, it hurt to understand I could not go on, but quickly I understood that life was working for me until that moment and that by the ease and effortlessness I was traveling by, and that now life was telling me: "Enough, time to move on."

When we hitched our first ride away from the village, I turned around toward the French man and told him: "I feel as if I let go of the dream, I feel free."

I sure hope it helped somebody...
With more love than any words can describe,
Uriel

Comment by Qais M. Yousef on August 7, 2010 at 5:47am

Well Done Eva, Thank you so much for this group.

A woman came out of her house and saw three old men with long white beards sitting in her front yard did not recognize them.

She said: I do not think I know you, but you must be hungry. Please come in to eat.

They asked:” Is your husband in the house?”

“No”, she replied.

“So we cannot”, they said.

In the evening when her husband came home, she told him what had happened.

He told her: "Go to them and ask them to enter!"

The woman went out and asked them to enter.

They replied: "We do not enter the house together."

She asked them: "Why?"

Then one of them said: "My name is (wealth), this (success)” pointing to one of his friends, “and that one is (love)”, pointing to the other.
Then he added: "Now go in and discuss with your husband which one of us want in your home”

The woman went in and told her husband what was said.

Happiness flooded her husband and said: "What a good thing, as long as it is let’s invite the (wealth). Let him come and fill our home with wealth!"

His wife disagreed, saying: "Dear, why do not we call (success)?"

Their daughter in law listened to them; she was sitting in one corner of the house.
“Would it not be better to invite (love)? Our home will then be filled with love!” Daughter in law suggested.

The husband said: "Let us take the advice of our son's wife! Go out and invite (love) to be our guest!"

The woman went out and asked the three: “Which one of you is (love)? I hope that you come in and be our guest.”

Raised the (love) and started walking toward the house. The other two also got up and followed him, which surprised.

She asked both (wealth) and (success): "I called (love) only, why are you coming?”

The old men replied together: "If you had invited (wealth) or (success) the other two will not get in, but since you invited Love (love) we go with him wherever he goes.


Wherever there is Love, there is wealth and success.

Comment by onlycasperman on August 6, 2010 at 9:56pm

Hello my sweet friend ''EVA'',thanks you so much for add me at in your group.When I was to be at in North of Iraq at in a small town,we are loooking a interesting news .Oneday we are went this small town and we saw that a old man sit down and crying side of a grave!And so I ask him;Why are you crying side of the grave?The old man looked me fullof with tears eyes and said me ;What will I do now without my wife? I asked againg him;Why?The oldman looked me and said me ;Because I have 3 childs and what I will look my childs,they of them 3 years old and I have not breasts for give milk this childs! Saw that all wars very dramatic for everybody!Yes we are thinked a little time and than after we are helped this old man and we are gived this man 1.000.00$ for buy milk! ...
Oneday again we are went this small town and looked this old man and we are found this old man and saw that this old man bought 2 cow for take milk from this cows for give childs!That is time we are to be very happy!
*******
All with my loves and hugs,
Mahmut Alan
TURKEY

Comment by Eva Libre on August 6, 2010 at 11:55am

Once there was an emperor in the Far East who was growing old
and knew it was coming time to choose his successor. Instead of
choosing one of his assistants or one of his own children, he
decided to do something different.

He called all the young people in the kingdom together one day.
He said, "It has come time for me to step down and to choose
the next emperor. I have decided to choose one of you." The kids
were shocked! But the emperor continued. "I am going to give
each one of you a seed today. One seed. It is a very special
seed. I want you to go home, plant the seed, water it and come
back here one year from today with what you have grown from
this one seed. I will then judge the plants that you bring to me,
and the one I choose will be the next emperor of the kingdom!"

There was one boy named Ling who was there that day and he,
like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly
told his mother the whole story. She helped him get a pot and
some planting soil, and he planted the seed and watered it
carefully. Every day he would water it and watch to see if it had
grown.

After about three weeks, some of the other youths began to talk
about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow.
Ling kept going home and checking his seed, but nothing ever
grew. Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by. Still nothing.

By now others were talking about their plants but Ling didn't have
a plant, and he felt like a failure. Six months went by, still nothing
in Ling's pot. He just knew he had killed his seed. Everyone else had
trees and tall plants, but he had nothing. Ling didn't say
anything to his friends, however. He just kept waiting for his
seed to grow.

A year finally went by and all the youths of the kingdom brought
their plants to the emperor for inspection. Ling told his mother
that he wasn't going to take an empty pot. But she encouraged
him to go, and to take his pot, and to be honest about what
happened. Ling felt sick to his stomach, but he knew his
mother was right. He took his empty pot to the palace.

When Ling arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown
by all the other youths. They were beautiful, in all shapes and
sizes. Ling put his empty pot on the floor and many of the other
kinds laughed at him. A few felt sorry for him and just said, "Hey
nice try."

When the emperor arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted
the young people. Ling just tried to hide in the back. "My, what
great plants, trees and flowers you have grown," said the emperor.
"Today, one of you will be appointed the next emperor!"

All of a sudden, the emperor spotted Ling at the back of the room
with his empty pot. He ordered his guards to bring him to the front.

Ling was terrified. "The emperor knows I'm a failure! Maybe he
will have me killed!"

When Ling got to the front, the Emperor asked his name. "My
name is Ling," he replied. All the kids were laughing and making
fun of him. The emperor asked everyone to quiet down. He looked
at Ling, and then announced to the crowd, "Behold your new
emperor! His name is Ling!"

Ling couldn't believe it. Ling couldn't even grow his seed. How could
he be the new emperor?

Then the emperor said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone
here a seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring
it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds which would not
grow. All of you, except Ling, have brought me trees and plants and
flowers. When you found that the seed would not grown, you
substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Ling was the only
one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in
it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new emperor!"

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