Stories about adaptation
2 Buddhist wisdom stories about adaptation from Buddhist teachers, each linked to the original talk.
- 'George, you stupid man'Story · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A woman who came to the Perth centre always belittled her husband in public — 'George, come over here. George, you stupid man.' Ajahn Brahm felt sorry for George, bullied and…
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There's this lady who's to come here and she would always she would always just embarrass her husband every time they came here. And I think, "Sir, I don't somebody may remember." It was It's George, George, come over here. George, you stupid man. George, George. And I always felt so sorry for George. And he was intimidated, he was bullied, he was harassed. And eventually, she passed away. When she passed away, I asked George afterwards, "Oh, you must be so relieved." He says, "No, I miss her so much." It's amazing what we get attached to.
- “Give me another hand”Story · Ajahn Brahm
In brief: A GP tells the parents of a boy born deaf that an article reports 10% of such children can have hearing restored by a simple operation. The parents agree and it works. But the…
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There was a case which I read uh in a scientific journal. There was a boy who was born deaf and uh one day his parents took him for a medical checkup with his GP. his GP had just read an article, you know, in one of the medical magazines that some researchers had found that 10% of children who were born deaf could have their hearing restored and with a very simple operation but only 10%. So the doctor said it seems that your boy know might be one of those 10%. Would you like to give it a try? And you know the parents asked you know is it really invasive? is going to be painful. It's going to be a bit of discomfort, but you know, who knows? You know, your kid may hear as result of the operation. So, the parents gave the child the operation and it worked. The child could hear again. And as soon as the child recovered from the operation with his hearing restored, he was really angry and upset at his parents. Said, "Why did you not ask me if I wanted to hear?" He said, "This is a terrible, terrible noise. I've got to figure this one out now." He said, "If you really wanted to help me, give me another hand." Because he had learned to use his hands to explore the world where other people would have used sound. And when I realized that this was a person who was deaf, it was a person who understood what it was like. And he said, "That's actually much better." He preferred being deaf.