Daily Meditation: Thursday, October 17, 2013

Curiosity - when wrongly directed can be a person’s downfall; image of the fly caught in a spider’s web

10/17/2013

Curiosity is certainly a very good quality; it is what has brought humanity to its present level of civilization. But it needs some degree of wisdom and direction. For, what do we often find? We see men and women who want to experience everything in life and who encourage one another to have the most daring experiences. They do not ask themselves where it will lead them or what difficulties and suffering they will meet with when they throw themselves into such experiences without caution or reflection. Observe a fly: it too is curious; it wants to know what that beautifully made web is, stretched across in front of it. It doesn’t realize the web is the work of a very crafty being, a spider lurking at the centre, watching and waiting… The fly ventures onto the web, becomes entangled in its threads and is trapped, to the great satisfaction of the spider, whose meal it will be. The same kind of curiosity can often be the downfall of humans. So, instead of throwing themselves into feeling, touching, tasting, watching and listening to anything and everything just because they want to experience it all, if they don’t wish to be devoured they must first identify any spiders’ webs stretched across in front of them.