There’s a famous Zen story about a humble farmer whose horse broke out of the enclosure one day and ran away. The villagers came to the farmer saying, “Oh, such bad luck, my friend,” to which the farmer replied: Good luck, bad luck, who knows?
A few days later, that same horse came back to the farm, bringing with him three wild mares. The neighbors screamed out: how lucky you are! To which the farmer replied: good luck, bad luck, who knows?
The next day, the farmer’s son tempts to tame one of the wild mares but falls off the horse and breaks his leg. The villagers again proclaimed how unlucky the situation was. Good luck, bad luck, who knows? said the farmer.
A week later, army officials passed by the village to recruit the young men to go to war, but when they got to the farmer’s house and saw the boy with the broken leg, they said he would be useless at war and, therefore, he got to stay with his family at the farm.
The story's moral shows us that we don't know when a situation is good or bad, and it's a good reminder to cultivate a sense of equanimity in our lives. In other words, to experience life with a sense of calm or even temper.
I think often of this story when things don’t go as I had planned. It reminds me that certain things are out of my control and that, more often than not, things are working out for me, not against me.
The story of how I met Dai Yu is a prime example of that...
Watch the Cross-Country Roadtrip (Part 2) on YouTube here!
KAILU, The Open Road.
A cross-country journey to meet the Chinese Changemakers in sustainability.
Roadtripping in China
Watch it here: The KAILU Docu Series
What can you expect?
A documentary about my journey across China, meeting the changemakers who bring positive change to their communities through sustainable practices.
In the first episode, you follow the journey from the very beginning ... In 2020, I had been running my own little company in sustainability in the city of Shanghai for 5 years, and it all came crumbling down by the end of the year. Picking the pieces back up, I ask myself two important questions: Who am I? What do I want to do? Together with my friends, and especially my friend Gaultier Letourneau-Ross, who is an independent producer, consultant, and advisor in the entertainment industry, we slowly built this old dream of mine. And the answers brought me on this journey. In July 2021, I packed my belongings in a storage space, rented an electric car, and left Shanghai to meet the people who inspired me outside of the city walls.
Watch it here: The KAILU Docu-Series