The Legend of the Blue Butterfly

There’s an Eastern legend that tells of a man who many years ago was widowed and left in charge of his two daughters.

The two girls were very curious, smart and were always eager to learn. They constantly overwhelmed their father with questions in order to satisfy their hunger for learning. Sometimes their father could answer them wisely. However, sometimes he struggled to find a suitable answer for his young ones.

Seeing the restlessness within his two little girls, he decided to send them off on vacation to live with and learn from a sage, who lived on a hilltop. The sage was capable of answering all of the questions the little girls asked him, without even hesitating.

However, the two sisters decided to set a mischievous trap for the sage, to truly measure his wisdom. One night, both of them started to hatch a plan: to ask the sage a question that he was incapable of answering.

– How can we trick the sage? What question can we ask him that he won’t be able to answer?- asked the youngest sister to her older kin.

– Wait here, I’ll show you right now- replied the older of the two.

The older sister went out to the woods and came back within the hour. She had her apron clasped shut like a sack, hiding something.

– What do you have in there?- asked the younger sister.

The older sister put her hand in the apron and showed the girl a beautiful blue butterfly.

– It’s so beautiful! What are you going to do with it?

– This will be our tool to ask the sage our trick question. We’ll go look for him, and I’ll be holding this butterfly in my hand. Then, I’ll ask the sage if the butterfly in my hand is alive or dead. If he answers that it’s alive, I’ll squeeze my hand and kill it. If he says that it’s dead, I’ll release it. Therefore, no matter what he answers, his answer will always be incorrect.

Accepting her older sister’s proposal, both girls went out to look for the sage.

Oh, wise one- said the older sister- Could you tell us if the butterfly that I have in my hand is alive or dead?

To which the sage, with a mischievous smile, replied: “That depends on you, it is in your hands.”

Our present and future is solely in our hands. We should never blame someone else when something goes wrong in our lives. If we lose something or if we find it, we are the only ones responsible.