A wise rabbi is on his deathbed, surrounded by his students. He tells his best student, “Life is…a river.” This message is passed down the line of students until it reaches the youngest, who asks, “But what does the rabbi mean, life is a river?” The question is then passed back up and the wisest student trembling asks the master, rabbi, I am sorry to ask but what do you mean by ‘Life is a river’?
For one last time old man opens his eyes and regards the student in unblinking silence, then he shrugs and turns up his palms. ‘Alright’, he says, “so it’s not a river then!”
To borrow the analysis from academic Wilford McClay who suggested the real wisdom doesn’t lie in getting life figured out. It lies in grasping the sense that you never will completely get it figured out.
There are many things that happen in our personal and professional lives which we are not able to figure out or figure out in the moment and rather than throwing ourselves into analysis paralysis and getting anxious about them, let’s accept like the rabbi that ‘Life is not a river’ and move on.
Thinking Space 