The Cracked Pot, A Hindu Story To Learn To Look At

This is the story of a peasant who lived by selling water in the market. It had about ten jars. Every day a stick was put on his shoulders very early. At each end hung a jar and carried it to the well and then to the center of town. However, among those vessels was a cracked vessel.

Curiously, this hardworking man always took the cracked pot to make the first trip of the day. He carried it, along with a vessel in perfect condition, to the well where the water was. He patiently collected the liquid and then carried it for more than two kilometers.

Obviously, by the time it reached the market, the cracked pot had already lost much of the water it contained. Thus, the peasant could only collect half  of what was agreed upon by her. On the other hand, the good pot was overflowing and allowed him to collect the full amount.

The shame of the cracked vessel

Soon the other vessels began to comment on the situation among themselves . They did not explain why the man still had the cracked pot, since it made him lose money every day. They also didn’t understand why she always carried it first on her daily commute.

On the other hand, the cracked pot began to feel ashamed. He had accompanied the peasant for the past ten years and was very fond of him. It felt bad to realize that it was only serving as a hindrance. He also didn’t understand why he hadn’t thrown it away.

He remembered the times when she was also a wonderful vessel, very useful to its owner. It did not have a single defect. She was one of the strongest in that daily bustle. However, one day the peasant had stumbled. It was then that it had been almost broken and partially useless. That had been a long time ago and the man still hadn’t gotten rid of her.

The way of water

The peasant used to do something that caught the attention of the cracked pot and the others. At certain times, during his daily walk to the well with the empty containers, the man would put his hand in his pocket and water something on the way. None of them knew what it was about.

Suddenly the peasant stopped carrying that something in his pockets and throwing it on the side of the road for some time. Then he would do the same again, but on the opposite shore. All the pots were intrigued, but since it was something he didn’t do all the time, they soon forgot about it and their curiosity wore off.

Conversations between the new vessels haunted the cracked vessel. In fact, she regretted being so useless and causing harm to the one who had bought her and cared for her for so long. So, without thinking more about it, he decided to talk to the peasant to get him to throw it away.

A beautiful moral

One night, when the peasant was getting ready to rest, the cracked pot called him and told him that he needed to speak with him. The man began to listen to her, very attentive to what she wanted to say to him. Without further ado, she told him what she thought. She knew he appreciated her, but she wasn’t used to being useless. She didn’t want him to keep her simply out of compassion. What he had to do was throw it away and get this all over with.

The peasant smiled when he heard her. He told her that he had never thought of throwing it away because it really was very useful to him. “Useful?” She asked. How useful was it going to be, if it just made him lose money every day. The man asked him to be calm. Tomorrow he would show her why he valued her so much. The cracked pot could hardly sleep.

The next day, the peasant told him: “I ask you to please observe everything on the side and side of the road to the well.” The pot then became very attentive. I looked both ways and could only see a beautiful path full of button flowers . When they reached the well, he told the farmer that he had not seen anything that would give him an answer.

The man looked at her fondly and said, “Since you cracked, I thought about the best way for you to continue to be of benefit. So I decided to scatter seeds from time to time along the way. Thanks to you I have been able to water them every day. And thanks to you when everything blooms I can take some plants and sell them on the market for a price higher than water ”. The cracked vessel then understood what its beautiful mission was.