Short Story of the Old Donkey

While taking a bath, I remembered this beautiful and inspiring story that was shared by our guest speaker in leadership training during our summer youth camp.

Photo by Laura Gariglio on Unsplash

Every time I was down and lonely with the feeling of being hopeless, I always keep this story in my mind to motivate and uplift me up. Maybe this is the most motivating and inspirational story I had ever heard. The story goes like this:

A farmer had an old donkey that he used for his farming and planting. One day the farmer noticed the old donkey was missing. Several days had passed but still, he did not know where his donkey had gone. While walking on his farm, he heard a plea coming from the old, deep-well. He went near the deep-well and realized that his old donkey was there asking for help.

But instead of thinking how to get his donkey out of the well - he thinks about how the old donkey was already weak and useless to him. So, he decided to abandon the donkey. Besides, his neighbors had already planned to cover the old well anyway, because it was already dilapidated and dangerous. The donkey cried and cried, but his master never gives pity on him.

On the day the people started to shovel soil and put it into the well, the donkey realized that his master and other people were about to bury him alive. As they shoveled and put the soil into the well and onto the old donkey, it began to shake its body and step up and up as the dirt piled higher - until the donkey escapes from the deep-well by saving its own life.

Lesson:

The lesson of the story is that even though people will throw dirt on you, it depends on you alone whether you will be buried or escape. The dirt which was thrown on the donkey become its stepping stone to save its own life. There are different challenges in our life, but we must be strong and convert the dirt into the inspirations and stepping stones to reach our dreams.