The pencil

A boy was watching his grandmother write a letter. At one point he asked: “Are you writing a story about what we´ve done?” “Is it a story about me?”.

His grandmother stopped writing her letter and said to her grandson: “I am writing about you, actually, but more important than the words is the pencil I´m using. I hope you will be like this pencil when you grow up.”

Intrigued, the boy looked at the pencil. It didn´t seem very special, “But it´s just like any other pencil I´ve ever seen!”

“That depends on how you look at things. It has five qualities which, if you manage to hang on them, will make you a person who is always at peace with the world.”

“First quality: you are capable of great things, but you must never forget that there is a hand guiding your steps. We call that hand God, and He always guides us according to His will.”

“Second quality: now and then, I have to stop writing and use a sharpner. Thar makes the pencil suffer a little, but afterwards, he´s much sharper. So you, too, must learn to bear certain pains and sorrows, because they will make you a better person.”

“Third quality: the pencil always allows us the use an eraser to rub out any mistakes. This means that correcting something we did is not necessarily a bad thing; it helps to keep us on the road to justice.”

“Fourth quality: what really matters in a pencil is not its wooden exterior, but the graphite inside. So always pay attention to what is happening inside you.”

“Finally, the pencil´s fifth quality: it always leaves a mark, in just the same way, you should know that everything you do in life will leave a mark, so try to be conscious of that in your every action.”

by: Paulo Coelho.

Book: “Like the Flowing River”

Enjoy it!

S.A.:)