Rain

Recently it has been raining. I was out with my son (Eehan) and a lovely conversation happened between us, which led to this story.

Eehan: I don’t like rain to fall on me.
Me: When it rains, it falls on everyone.

Eehan starts running.

Eehan: I want to run and hide from the rain.
Me: When it rains, it falls everywhere. You cannot run from it.

We made it to the car before it started raining heavy.

The next day, we knew it might rain again, so we remembered to pack our umbrellas. This time when it started raining, Eehan pulled out his green frog umbrella, and we continued to our car.

This experience made me think, how nature treats us all equal. The rain, the sun, the ocean doesn’t discriminate — on color, culture, actions, status. Rich/Poor, Old/Young, Man/Women, we all get treated the same. What if nature started judging similar to us? How our species would have evolved? This experience made me contemplate these questions.

Also, I felt the next day, having the umbrella has a lesson on its own. Instead of asking the rain not to fall or run away from it, all we need is skillful living. Just pull out the umbrella, and we are good to go. This experience, in turn, made me think how we respond is so important. The actual event doesn’t even matter — its just a combination of causes and conditions, and comes and goes on its own.

Both a smile and frown starts inside us.

Gassho!