Cherish Every Taste of Life

There was a very disappointed man. He climbed a cherry tree and was ready to jump off the tree to end his own life. Just when he decided to jump, a school bell rang.

A group of children ran over and saw the man standing on a tree. One child asked, "What are you doing on top of a tree?" The man couldn’t tell the child that he was about to commit suicide. So he said, "I was looking at the scenery."

"Do you see that around you, there are many cherries?" Another child asked. The man looked down. Discovered that because he wholeheartedly wanted to commit suicide, did not notice the tree was covered with large and small red cherries. "Can you help us pick some cherries?" The children asked. "You just shake the tree hard and the cherry will fall. Please! We cannot climb so high."

The disappointed man felt frustrated but couldn’t ignore the children so he had promised to help. He began to dance and shake the tree. Soon enough, cherries  have fallen from the tree. On the ground, more and more children gathered. Everyone was so excited and happy to pick up the cherries. After a burst of playfulness, most of the cherries fell out, and the children gradually dismissed. The disappointed man sat on the tree. After he watched those happy kids, not knowing why, his feelings and thoughts of suicide were gone. He picked some cherries from the tree that hadn’t fallen off. With no alternative, he climbed down from the cherry tree – holding some cherries in hand, he slowly walked back home.

When he got home, he looked at the same old broken house, same old wife and kids. But his children were happy to see their father come home with cherries in hand. When the family ate dinner together, he looked at his children happily eating the cherries. He suddenly had a new perspective and feeling, he was thinking: Maybe this kind of life is still worth living. The disappointed man gave up the idea of suicide.

A new perspective often comes when you least expected it. The feelings of disappointment often will allow the feelings of hope to arise. Our lives will not always have blue and clear skies. We do not have the abilities to control weather. But we have the ability to control our own feelings. Life is like weather. Today it may be a raining day; tomorrow it may be a beautiful sunny day.