The Dragon and the Beach
Long ago, on a tall mountain, lived one of the last of the wise dragons. Every day, this wise dragon would leave its cave and head down the mountain to a particular clearing about halfway down the mountain. There, people from around the land could come and ask the dragon questions, and she would give them her wisdom.
From time-to-time, people would even stay on the mountain and train as an apprentice of the wise dragon.
On this day, the wise dragon had many visitors, who posed many questions. At the end of the day, the last man to walk up to the dragon and ask a question was a young, poor merchant who had been trying hard for the last two years to become financially stable but had not succeeded as of yet.
He walked up and asked the wise dragon, “What is the one thing that I can do to
become successful in my business?” The wise dragon thought for a moment, then told the young man that, “If you truly want to be successful, meet me at the beach tomorrow morning before the sun has woken for the day, and I will teach you the secret.”
So, the next morning, the young man showed up at the beach in his best robe,
looking to impress the wise dragon and learn the secret to making lots of money. As soon as the young man approached the wise dragon on the beach, the old, wise dragon said, “If you want to know the secret to success, follow me.”
Then the dragon started to lead the young man out in the waves. At first, they walked out to the point where the merchant was standing knee deep in water.
Here, the merchant paused and asked the wise dragon, “I sell robes, not fish, what are we doing in this freezing water, wise one?
The wise dragon just ignored this and said, “A bit farther, don’t worry, the water
holds many secrets.” And then whispered, “Not just to fishermen.”
The dragon journeyed farther out into the sea. The young man followed, now feeling uncomfortable in his soaking wet fine robes. The man was now almost at his shoulder depth, and the dragon was almost to its underbelly. The waves keep hitting the merchant in the face. It was here the old, wise dragon turned to the young man and said, “You want to know how to be successful?”
The young man said, “Yes,” while spitting out a mouthful of seawater
that had splashed him in the face. The young merchant had been unaware that
the dragon’s tail had been slowly creeping up behind him under the water. It was now that the wise dragon used this tail to grab the merchant by the top of the head and pushed him underwater. The wise dragon held the young man’s head under the water and quickly counted to twenty, then let the young merchant up.
The young merchant’s head came up out of the water gasping for air. with a shocked and angry look on his face. The old, wise dragon said to him, “When you were underwater, what was the one thing you wanted?”
The young man, completely confused and worried for his life, started to stammer, “wh…. Wh… what…?”
The wise dragon repeated herself. “When you were underwater, what was the one
thing you wanted?”
Now the young merchant proclaimed a bit angrily. “I WANTED TO BREATHE!”
The old wise dragon said, “YES, and you will only truly be successful, when you want to succeed more than you wanted to breathe, just then.”
The man still looked a little confused and angry. So, the dragon continued. “If you want to succeed, you will need to want it as much as you want to breath. Success must be the thought that wakes you in the morning, feeds you throughout the day, and tucks you in when you lay down to rest at the end of the day.”
The man was still angry, the wisdom of the dragon was not sinking into his mind.
The wise dragon could see this, so, she tried one more time to make herself clear.
“You want to succeed. That is clear by you following me out into the water today.
Many want to succeed, my child. If you want it more than them and you put more effort into it than them, you will be one of the many who find success.”
The man’s anger subsided as the wisdom of the dragon became clear.
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