An woman in a small Indian village had a pet Mongoose which was very fond of her toddler son. While the woman attended to her daily chores, the Mongoose used to play with the toddler.
One day while the woman was busy working, the Mongoose was playing with her son. Suddenly a snake appeared from nowhere and attacked the toddler. The Mongoose put up a brave fight to save the toddler and killed the snake.
When the woman returned the Mongoose went running to her in excitement and in expectation of reward for the great service that it had rendered. It could not communicate in words but tried with gestures to explain to her what happened. The woman could not understand but was terrified to see blood in the mouth and body of the Mongoose. She thought that the Mongoose had eaten her son. Out of sheer anger she immediately killed the Mongoose.
Seconds later she found her toddler unharmed and a dead snake nearby. She realized what might have happened and started crying.
This is a story from Upanishad. The morale? Never rush to conclusions.
I think we need to bring in a slight change in the morale of the story. Apart from the teachings for humans, there is some morale lessons for the Mongoose too.
Never try to communicate to those who risks misunderstanding you. Rather than the woman's failure to take decisions logically, it was the failure of the Mongoose to communicate with the woman. What do you say?
good one :) If you consider this as an example of effective communication than the learning manufactured by you is brilliant. In fact apart from being a case on ethics and decision making , this can also be an interesting case on communication !!
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