Truth

Once there was a man who said some things about a friend that were neither true nor complimentary. Afterwards, he felt ashamed and went to his friend and apologized. Still, as he walked around town, he could hear the false words being repeated. Troubled by this, he went to the wisest man in the community.

"How can I undo this terrible wrong that I did", he asked the wise man. The wise man thought for a moment and said, "Bring me a feather pillow." The man did so and quickly returned. "Now go to the hilltop outside of town, slit open the pillowcase, and shake it until all of the feathers are gone." Again, the man quickly did as he was instructed. When he returned to the wise man, the wise man said, "Now go and pick up every single feather and place them all back into the pillowcase." The man replied, "But that's impossible. There is no way that I can find all those feathers and put them back." "Indeed," answered the wise man, "and there is no way to gather back the words that you cast into the air either."

And so it is. Once we speak, we can never gather the words back into the pillowcase. So it is important to think about what we are going to say before we cast our words into the wind.

Alan R. Houser