Kill The Child — Your Life Depends On It

The text might be horrific but the subtext is not — DO this TODAY if you want peace!

Back in school, I had a subject called “Moral Science,” and to study the subject, we were issued an illustrated book for that class.

Some stories in that book had some pretty deep themes. I’m not too sure how many children at that age are capable of understanding it.

I vividly remember one of the stories with some pictures I found frightening as a child.

This one hit me hard a few years back when I came across it while reading my nephew’s moral science book of illustrations.

STORY

It’s about a king who used to ride alone to clear his head.

One day a small child approached him and stabbed him with a toy sword. The king was touched by the boy’s playful and fearless spirit, came down from his horse, laughingly brushed aside the weapon, and kissed the child.

The next day, the child appeared again, a little bigger and stronger, and the scenario repeated itself. The king laughed.

Each day, the boy grew in size, and his sword grew in heft.

The king protected himself easily and spared his opponent. He quite enjoyed this diversion during his solitary rides.

The boy became a young man and now wielded a tempered blade. There came a day when the king had to expend all his skill and strength to parry his strokes and was wounded when he finally subdued his adversary.

The king was angry now, but the young man cried piteously, so the king sheathed his sword and spared his life.

The following day, the muscular man jumped from the tree and knocked the king from his horse.

In a flash, the man disarmed the king and bound his hands.

The king was bemused and complacent. “Okay, you finally won,” he said. “Tomorrow will be a different story.”

“There will be no tomorrow,” the man said sourly as he lopped off the king’s head.

SUBTEXT

A gruesome story for a seven-year-old, but the lesson it conveyed was powerful.

We have many destructive tendencies and addictions.

They all begin with a vague and comforting desire, like the tendrils of some tropical plant. You tell yourself,

“I’ll have one more cigarette because it feels so good, and I need it to calm my nerves. One more drink to relax after this horrible day.”

Sure — one cigarette, or one drink, or one serving of junk food, or one whatever won’t hurt?

“First, you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you.” — F. Scott Fitsgeral

“You did not become fat with a single bite or a single meal.”

And that is where you begin your destructive slide.

What is addiction, really? It is a sign, a signal, a symptom of distress. It is a language that tells us about a plight that must be understood.

One will not hurt. But many ones piled on top of each other become devastating.

Nobody takes that first puff, that first sip, that first snort — thinking they want to be an addict.

It happens to the best of us, the problem is we underestimate the child and are under the illusion that we can control that child.

Both can have terrible consequences.

LAST

The tendril becomes a thick cord that can strangle you. The small child becomes a man and decapitates you.

The priority of an addict is to anesthetize the pain of living to ease the passage of day with some purchased relief.

You did not become fat with a single bite or a single meal. Your life did not stagnate because of a single ill-spent day.

Recognize the child that, when grown up, can raze your dreams.

Odds are that your foe is not a child anymore.

But he is still weaker than you. Kill him right now.

Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.

A friend of mine who worked extremely hard in order to recover from his drinking habit once told me —

I understood myself only after I destroyed myself. And only in the process of fixing myself, did I know who I really was.

Until next time,

Ciao!

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