What Is Important

What Is Important

I was scanning my old papers when I found a short story from the unknown author entitled “What Is Important?” and thought of sharing it to everyone. The story goes like this;

A young boy watched his father walked into the living room….

The boy noticed that his brother, John began to cower slightly as his father entered. The older boy sensed that John had done something wrong. Then he saw form the distance what his brother had done. The younger boy had open his father’s brand new hymnal and scribbled all over the first page with a pen.

Staring at their father fearfully, both brothers waited for John’s punishment. The father picked up the prized hymnal, looked at it carefully and then sat down, without saying a word. Books were precious to him; he was a minister with several academic degrees. For him, books were knowledge.

What he did next was remarkable. Instead of punishing his brother, instead of scolding, or yelling, his father took the pen from the little boy’s hand, and then wrote in the book himself, alongside the scribbles that John had made. Here is what that father wrote: “John’s work, 1959, age 2. How many times have I looked into your beautiful face and into your warm, alert eyes looking up at me and thanked God for the one who has now scribbled in my new hymnal? You have made the book sacred, as have your brother and sister to us much of my life.” “Wow,” thought the older brother, “This is punishment?”

Since that time, the hymnal has become a treasured family possession. It is a tangible proof that their parents love them. (End)

This story touches me so much. It taught the lesson that what really matter is people, not objects. They are the one that we must treasure and not the things that we can buy in the department store. Things that would last for only a couple of hours, days,weeks, etc. and also what matter is patience, not judgment. We tend to lost patient when we are overrated by our judgments and losing it is one of the reasons we lost trust to people and without even knowing it we lost the people we valued. Patient is indeed is one of the component of a great relationship. And most importantly this story taught me that what matter most is love, not anger. anger ruins everything.