Apple Farm Community
Apple Farm Community Inc. 
12291 Hoffman Road  
Three Rivers ° Michigan ° 49093 ° U.S.A.
 
(269) 244-5993

​E-MAIL  (click icon below)
  • Apple Farm Community
  • About Apple Farm
  • Donate
  • Writings of Helen Luke
    • The California Meditations
    • Apple Farm Pamphlets
    • Old Age: Journey Into Simplicity
    • Dark Wood to White Rose
    • Kaleidoscope
    • Such Stuff as Dreams are Made On
    • Parabola Journal
  • Contact
  • Calendar
  • Thursday Group Videos
  • Apple Farm Blog
  • Farm Publications
  • Apple Farm At Home Retreat
  • Links

The Wolves Within

3/6/2018

1 Comment

 
FROM APPLE FARM WRITER,  John Stempien. John lives in southwest, Michigan

    There is a legend known by variant titles: Which one do you feed, Grandfather Tells, The Wolves Within, and Tale Of Two Wolves. Its origin is currently unknown. Some have attributed it as a Cherokee legend.

    An old Cherokee chief was teaching his grandson about life. "A fight is going on inside me," he said to the boy. "It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, self-doubt, and ego. The other is good - he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. This same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too."
    The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf will win?"
    The old chief simply replied, "The one you feed."


    I am reminded of Helen Luke’s insight about this inner struggle and how it plays out in our outer world, specifically, how the individual responds to what he deems evil in a turbulent time. She writes in Dark Wood to White Rose, “Evil must indeed be exposed, and denounced, and fought by word and action, but it is never conquered by mere exposure nor by the passion of rejection nor by action alone, necessary as these things are. It becomes powerless before one thing only, which is the certainty of a man who, while evading nothing of the dark facts, asserts and acts out of the joy at the heart of life. This is not cheap optimism, nor has it to do with superficial happiness. It is a kind of certainty that can never be born out of evasion; indeed, those who do not know it are the ones who evade, for in some way they have refused or have been unable to face the conscious ‘journey into self.’ " (p. xiv.)

    May we continue to feed ourselves, “the joy at the heart of life.”
1 Comment
Gail
3/7/2018 12:48:29 pm

Wise words. Thank you.

Reply



Leave a Reply.


    ...it is in part by our response to the great stories of the world  that we too can begin to find, each of us this individual story expressing the symbolic meaning behind the facts of our fate and behind the motives that determine the day-to-day choices of our lives.  -Helen Luke, The Inner Story

    Archives

    February 2021
    September 2020
    July 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    March 2016
    February 2016

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly