I came across this today in a group email. It is a wonderful story .

[sassenach]

This is someones lifestory today, but what came of it was something as preppers, and our own personal growth made me think it was definitely worth sharing and remembering...

 

Story below: Are you a carrot, an egg or coffee?

I thought this might be a good time to post this here and maybe give everyone a chance to take a look at themselves to see what they are......... a carrot, an egg, or a coffee bean.

Little story first - my Mom sent me this.

 

She & I........she and *nobody*.... ...get along or agree unless it's always her that you agree with or do things only the way she wants. This has been going on for almost 58 years (this coming March ) of my life - I'm the oldest "child" in my family.

It's created times of great stress, times of not talking because life was just happier not having to try and please her all the time only to find out that whatever efforts you gave were never good enough.

It's made all my brothers "escape" the state and move to far corners of the nation just *to* be able to live the lives they'd wanted to have and not have to try & live up *to* endlessly impossible expectations of my Mother.

I'm different. I stayed in the state, 'tho live about halfway across it from her right now. I homestead - I have horses & chickens & dogs & a cat, I grow my own gardens for food and herbs for healing & other things, built my own house myself, struggle to survive and succeed. And, the worst "downfall" to my Mother, I am not by any means wealthy.

But

I AM HAPPY WITH MY LIFE. My Mother isn't by any means, and never will be. She doesn't even know who I am and I don't think ever has. The only picture she has of me in her mind is the one of expectations that she has for me.

Someone once said, after meeting my Mother, that she flew her own spaceship that had not yet, and may never, land on this earth. Just recently, someone else called her "borderline bi-polar". ( my quote, read in any overly dominant parent, who is disappointed in your life choices. )

So the other day when she sent me this little story, her words at the end of (not included here) completely threw me for the biggest loop of my entire life. What she said was something I never ever would've dreamed she'd *ever* see.

Maybe in her aging years that spaceship is finally running out of a little bit of steam & tipping it's wings to touch a little more toward earth.

She said "Kate, you are the coffee bean"

 

Read this story & try and figure out what you are......... ...the carrot, the egg, or the coffee bean.

 

Are You a Carrot, An Egg, or a Coffee Bean?

Anonymous

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved a new one arose.

 

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water. In the first, she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs and the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil without saying a word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl.

Turning to her daughter, she asked, "Tell me what do you see?"

"Carrots, eggs, and coffee," she replied.

She brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. She then asked her to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard-boiled egg. Finally, she asked her to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled, as she tasted its rich aroma.

The daughter then asked. "What does it mean, mother?"

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity-boiling water-but each reacted differently.

The carrot went in strong, hard and unrelenting. However after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak.

The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior. But, after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened.

The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water they had changed the water.

"Which are you?" she asked her daughter. "When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg, or a coffee bean?"

Think of this: Which am I? Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity, do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength?

Am I the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? Did I have a fluid spirit, but after death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trial, have I become hardened and stiff? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and a hardened heart?

Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor.

If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hours is the darkest and trials are their greatest do you elevate to another lever?

How do you handle Adversity? Are you a Carrot, an egg, or a

coffee bean?

 

 

Me commenting:I thought this was a really great story, and maybe some of us have changed from one to another. I know I relate to the story and thought it was a wisdom to share, this story by this person, regarding the big question at the top.