Friday, June 29, 2007

The Battle of Two Wolves


One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes
on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between two "wolves"
inside us all..

One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed,
arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority,
and ego.

The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility,
kindness, benevolence,empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."

The grand son thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather:
"Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

24 comments:

Brooke said...

That's a good parable, Eyes. It'll give me something to chew on for awhile!

nanc said...

'ZACTLY!

now, i'm off to feed my good wolf.

p.s. - we have a wolf hybrid - a shepherd mix - she'll be eight this august and is perhaps one of the best pets we've ever had the pleasure of sharing space with. she will gingerly eat around her food while little chicks the size of cottonballs are roaming about her food dish.

i'll say with confidence, she would starve before she'd harm one of OUR farm animals and she's quite the hog-herder.

she does like to go roll in fresh cow patties and once came home with a .22 gunshot wound to the hiney, but she'd never harm a farm animal - the people just didn't know it.

Eyes said...

Hi Nanc, She sounds like a sweetheart. I had a coyote mix once, and she was a lunatic! She would growl at me if she was licking out a tasty bowl. I had to go get the broom and guide her away from it. She was pretty nuts, but we loved her... alot.

Always On Watch said...

Isn't that a great story?

All too often, we feed the evil wolf.

Anonymous said...

I feed 'em both... only I like to "focus" them properly.

Eyes said...

:>) I'm afraid I feed a lot of them too!

Gayle said...

I'm trying not to feed my evil wolf, but he really gets hungry and irritable when I ignore him altogether, so I occasionally throw him a scrap or two.

Great parable, Eyes. I'm going to snag it. :)

Anonymous said...

Such an excellent parable. We all feed the evil wolf from time to time. Some more than others. Thanks. Im going to be doing alot more thinking now.

Anonymous said...

i think what you wrote was so true i have a big personalty and a even bigger temper. So it can be hard to keep the evil wolf in for me but i really think your story has a meaning!! ***

Eyes said...

Hi Anon, Yes, I guess we all do:>D

Anonymous said...

This is such a great parable. I've heard it a lot of times before, but I still really love it. I usually accidentally end up feeding the evil wolf more than the good one; it's hard to continue on feeding the good one.

Eyes said...

Hi Blake, isn't that the truth. I guess if we all practice feeding the good one, we'll become better at it:?D

Anonymous said...

Hmmm, I think I remember seeing this parable in a movie called Pathfinder. Definitely wasn't Cherokee.

Anonymous said...

Absolutely beautiful! I regocnize very much of it, I have been feeding the the evil wolf within for the past 8 years but since a month or two I'm feeding the good one.
I copied the text to use it for an artwork.
No commercial use, it's 100% self expression.
Thank you for posting it.

Anonymous said...

i think feeding both of 'em is my way. Since both are in me i'll make 'em both stronger and learn from them! ;-)

Anonymous said...

That was just too good,or it could be too bad.

Nicole said...

Hey Eyes, where did you find this photo?

Eyes said...

Hi Nicole, Geepers, I can't remember. I would have googled something like "wolf" or "wolves"...

Nicole said...

Thank for getting back to me. The reason I am curious is that I would like to find the person who took the photo because I am interested in getting their permission to use as a logo for my company! I have been searching and searching to no avail on google to find the pic. Any other clues that you can remember that might lead me to the website? :)

Eyes said...

Ya, sorry Nicole, I find most of my pics just like all the other bloggers on the web --- googling. The results of a google today is different from what is googled yesterday. I wish you luck though. It is a terrific pic in retrospect. I love animals, and specifically wolves. They have lost so much of their territory to humans.. Sad.

Anonymous said...

It should be noted, that this parable is very old and the original author remains unknown. Though it can be found in many variations. Its good to see that people can find themselves in it. The question remains what will they take from it.

Anonymous said...

Wow, we know which he's feeding...

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