A Short Story to Become Wiser (and Be More Present)

11 Jan 2026 #misc

One day, a man approached a Zen master with a question.

“Master, what can a simple man like me do to become wiser like you?”

The Zen master said, “Well, I just sleep, eat, and talk.”

“Hmm, I already do that. But I’m not a wise man like you,” the man said.

“You may do that. But when I sleep, I’m simply sleeping. When I eat, I’m simply eating. And when I talk, I’m simply talking. When you sleep, you remember problems. When you eat, you use your phone. And when you talk, you think about what to ask next or how to answer.”

I first heard that story in a Sunday sermon, and it stayed with me.

It reminds me of a lesson from Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now. Our mind is like a time machine, taking us to the past (where guilt and resentment live) and into the future (where anxiety lives). But wisdom begins when we step off that machine and live in the present.