*~Life is like a book    Chapter by chapter they close    But as new pages are turned    New hopes are revealed.~*     

Once upon a time, there was a king. The king liked one of his followers very much because he was very wise and always gave very good advice.     Therefore the king took him along wherever he went. 

One day, the king was bitten by a dog, the finger was injured and the wound got worse and worse.  He asked the follower if that was a bad sign. The follower said, 'Good or bad, hard to say'.   In the end, the finger got so infected that it just had to be severed.  The king asked the follower again if that was a bad sign.  Again, the follower gave the same answer, 'Good or bad, hard to say'. The king got very angry and sent the follower to prison.  

One day, the king went hunting in the jungle. He got excited when he  was on the chase of a deer.  Deeper and deeper he went inside the jungle.     In the end he found himself lost in the jungle. To make things worse, he was captured by the native people who lived inside the jungle.  They wanted to sacrifice him to their God.   But when they noticed that the king had one finger short, they released him immediately as he was not a 'perfect' man and not suitable for sacrifice.   

The king managed to get back to his palace after all.   And he finally understood the follower's wise quote, 'Good or bad, hard to say'.   If he hadn't lost that one finger, he could have been killed by the native people.   He ordered the release of the follower, and apologized to him.    But to the king's amazement, the follower was not mad at him at all.   Instead, the follower said, 'It wasn't a bad thing that you locked me up'.   Why?  Because if the king hadn't locked the follower up, he would have brought the  follower along to the jungle.  If the natives had found that the king was not suitable, they would have used the follower.   Again, the quote 'Good or bad, hard to say' stands.  

The moral of the story is that for everything that happens in this world, there is no absolute good or bad.     Sometimes good things turn out to be bad things eventually, while bad things become a gain.  Whatever good things that happen to you, enjoy it, but don't to hold on too tight to it.   Treat it as a surprise in your life.     Whatever bad things that happen to you, don't feel too sad or despair over it because in the end, it might turn out not to be such a bad thing after all.     If one can understand this, he or she will find life much easier to handle.

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