At the edge of a great forest stood a hermitage where young warrior-ascetics
trained — boys who would one day be both fighters and seekers. Among them
was Druva, the youngest and the most impatient. He wanted to be calm and
wise all at once, today, and when his mind kept galloping off during
meditation, he would throw up his hands. "It's no use!" he'd cry. "My mind
will never settle. I might as well give up."
His teacher, a grey-bearded sage named Aśvala, never scolded him. Instead,
one morning he handed Druva a thick rope, as wide as the boy's wrist, and a
small blunt knife. "Cut through this," he said.
Druva sawed at it. The rope was made of many twisted strands, and the dull
knife barely scratched it. "This is impossible," he panted. "It's far too
thick."
"Don't try to cut the whole rope," said Aśvala calmly. "You cannot.
Cut one strand. Just one."
So Druva picked out a single fibre and worked at it patiently — and
snip, it parted. "There," said the sage. "Now another." Strand by strand,
fibre by fibre, the boy kept cutting, and slowly, to his amazement, the
great rope grew thinner, looser, until at last it fell apart in two.
"This," said Aśvala, sitting beside him, "is what yoga truly is. You are
tied to your sorrows and your restlessness by a thick rope of habit. You
will never slice through it in one heroic stroke, no matter how hard you
pull. But every quiet morning you sit and steady your mind, you cut one
strand. The rope loosens. You will not feel it the first day, or the
tenth. But keep going — with a firm heart that refuses to be discouraged —
and one day the whole rope of pain simply gives way, and you are free."
He looked kindly at the boy. "The seekers who arrive are not the ones with
the sharpest knives, Druva. They are the ones who do not throw the knife
down. Decide that you will keep cutting. That decision is half the battle."
Druva looked at the parted rope in his hands. The next morning, when his
mind wandered, he did not cry out or give up. He simply, quietly, brought
it back — and cut one more strand.
