SMARTS - Another Parable for Our Times

Here's another piece from Dr. David K. Reynolds' book Pools of Lodging for the Moon, from which I quoted last Thursday.

This one isn't hard to interpret and relate to personally, on a few levels. Astrology-literate passers-by will be able to see connections to .......let's see.....Saturn cycles, Pluto conjunct a personal planet. For Chiron fanciers, there's something there too. There might well be much more to find. Thoughts welcome.

SMARTS

Once upon a wishful time pocket-sized dragons roamed the land. They attacked humans at will. They attacked anything in sight. Their bites rarely killed, but they were painful and took time to heal. People walked about with scars.

A philosopher arose who claimed that getting to know the dragons would cause them to cease their attacks. He and his followers made great efforts to understand and communicate with the miniature dragons. As a result, they suffered many bites, but they gathered much information about the dragons' habits.

Unfortunately the philosopher was wrong. Knowing a lot about dragons didn't stop them from attacking. The people felt despair. Some tried to appease the dragons with every kind of personal gift and sacrifice imaginable. But giving in to the dragons seemed to be ineffective, also. In fact sacrificing their material possessions to try to keep the dragons at bay proved more costly than enduring the occasional bite. What could they do? The people were at a loss.

All sorts of methods proved unworkable. Heavy armor restricted the wearer's movements. Flight to the mountains and beachs demonstrated only that dragons existed in those places, too. Prayers didn't destroy the dragon demons.

In time people learned to live with occasional pain. They avoided areas heavily infested with dragons. They kept their eyes open to avoid stepping into the path of a dragon. But they learned to go about their daily lives wearing a bandage here and there. Often, they were so involved in their work or play that they forgot about the pain, the bandages, the dragons. Such was the nature of the country.

Psychological insight doesn't erase pain or prevent its reoccurrence. It may help us spot potential trouble areas. Though we avoid what is avoidable, we cannot escape from hurt altogether. We live alongside it; we live within it; we live it. And the way we live in spite of our pain is a measure of our character.

I am told that in the dragon-infested country introduced above some people actually befriended and even married particularly large dragons. And, despite differences in their temperaments, they seem to have gotten along together pretty well.