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Friday, January 24, 2025

A Different Mustard Seed Parable

Last week I expressed frustration with finding a story in the wake of the devastating fires in Southern California. I prowled and prowled and finally found internet references to "an old Chinese tale." Went through the old (2016) Story-Lovers.com still housed on The Wayback Machine -- a wonderful resource set up by the late Jackie Baldwin incorporating suggestions of fellow members of the email list, Storytell .  The list continues, maintained as a resource by the National Storytelling Network, but there's still gold to be found at the old Story-Lovers site. (I've had people mention difficulty using it and will gladly help anyone wanting to try it.) Found the story's name is "The Mustard Seed" and was listed as Chinese, so I checked all Chinese books in my large folktale collection, then on to Project Gutenberg, and also the books at the Internet Archive without luck. This time I went back to those internet searches with a bit more information as I learned it was a Buddhist parable. The only problem was the text tended to be antiquated and included parts unrelated to the core of the Mustard Seed story as well as primarily focused on death. Yes, death is a part of the news from the fires which have once again moved into new areas, but it's also the death of so much more ... the other parts of life before the fire that the survivors are experiencing.

Most of us know a different parable about a Mustard Seed as told by Jesus. It's important. It's not my intent to say anything against it, but the people were remembering "an old Chinese tale" about a Mustard Seed telling a different story. They gave summaries, but I wanted more! Then I found a blog article, "A Different Mustard Seed Parable"on http://lazywmarie.com/. She gives the perfect summary, quoting the brief version given by the Dalai Lama in his The Book of Joy.  Like Marie, I like the way it "is a new way to think of grief and how it connects us to each other." We both agree it is about much more than death, even though it certainly is important.

The more I looked at the Lazy Marie blog, the more I felt at home with her and her animals and Oklahoma "hobby farm." To reach her for permission, I discovered her Facebook page and feel so at home that I'm now a follower of her "The (Not Always) Lazy W Blog." 

It's not the frequent "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" type of story usually given here. Instead it takes us to something that should be considered part of the world's wisdom found in religious literature. Here is Marie's article in its entirety.

a different mustard seed parable

Friends, here is a Mustard Seed parable for you to soak in. But probably not the one you already know. One of the hundreds of delicious little treasures I want to share with you from The Book of Joy is a new way to think of grief and how it connects us to each other.

This story is a Buddhist fable shared by the Dalai Lama. I’m just going to quote the short paragraph directly from the book:

“A woman lost her child and was inconsolable in her grief, carrying her dead child throughout the land, begging for someone to help heal her child. When she came to the Buddha, she begged him to help her. He told him he could help her if she would collect mustard seeds for the medicine. She eagerly agreed, but then the Buddha explained that the mustard seeds needed to come from a home that had not been touched by death. When the woman visited each house in search of the mustard seeds that might heal her son, she discovered there was no house that had not suffered the loss of a parent, or a spouse, or a child. Seeing that her suffering was not unique, she was able to bury her child in the forest and release her grief.”

It doesn’t have to be death, though that is a loss that will eventually unite all of us and possibly the one we all fear the most. I can easily think of several bright, terrifying moments of grief in my own life that have actually softened the more I looked around and saw that other people had lived through the same, or worse. Usually much worse. I bet you would agree.

Seeing that her suffering was not unique, she was able to release her grief.

There’s a lot of comfort available in a loving community. And if we can open up enough, there’s a lot of healing and learning that can happen too. How do people survive trauma? How do they make sense of tragedy? How do they cope, and how do they thrive despite their circumstances and mistakes?

In friendships where I feel comfortable sharing the darkest chapters of our family’s story, and when I can be steady-nerved enough to listen to other people’s darkest chapters, God always shows up. He always showers this peaceful, soothing veil over all the chaos and fear. He answers by reminding me that we are not alone. We are neither the first nor the last to be terrified, and His Love accomplishes actual miracles

Things are hardly ever as bad as they feel when we think we are alone. When we think our suffering is unique.

Relax a little, into some trusted community. Dare to open up to other people’s suffering, if only to realize how not unique your own suffering is. Then let all of that emotion turn into compassion. And let that compassion turn to hope.

Check in again soon for more about community (Ubuntu, in the African tradition) and a couple of delicious mustard seed recipes. I wanted to include all of this together, but it’s just so much.

Happy Sunday friends. Thank you for checking in.

“A person is a person through other persons.”
~Archbishop Desmond Tutu
XOXOXO

 

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