The Wise Merchant & the Demons-A Buddhist Jataka Story

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

With the improved knowledge and technology, the world has become extremely competitive. Starting from kindergarten, every person has to deal with the competition. Though the competition has a positive impact, there are many examples that it has turned the other way around. Most of the time competition is unhealthy as everyone wanted to be the first.

Are you one of those people, who always wanted to be the first? First in the classroom exams, first to grab the toilet papers or the first of anything that you can think of. It is not necessary to say the benefits of being the first, undoubtedly there are more. However, do we need to push ourselves to be the first? What if your best effort ended up being second or third? Isn’t that good enough?

Let me elaborate this idea with an ancient Buddhist Jataka story;

Once upon a time, there were two merchants and each of them was the leader of 500 men and owned 500 bullock carts. A one head merchant was well known for his wisdom and the other one was his rivalry. They used to travel from town to town selling their products, carried by the bullock carts. They discovered a new location with profitable business opportunities and both the merchants wanted to travel to this new destination.