The Monk's Dilemma by Lyn Russell

Two Buddhist monks from Thailand were taking a walk one day beside a fast running stream. This day they come across a woman in distress who says her children are stranded on the other side of the river and she pleads for them to carry her across, as she herself is petrified of water.

However, in Thailand, monks take vows of charity and chastity that involves not even touching or brushing past a woman and this request now places them in a dilemma:

whether to be charitable and carry the woman across or respect their strict chastity vows and not touch her at all.

After some serious deliberation, they however decide to carry her across the stream to her children.

When the rescue mission is completed, the two monks cross back over and walk for several kilometers over the next few hours. One monk is very agitated. He exclaims, “we shouldn’t have broken our vows and touched that woman.” He chastises his fellow monk for not seemingly worrying about what he also did.

The second monk responds calmly:

“The reason I am not distressed is I put that woman down three hours ago……… you are still carrying her!!”

It is important to for us all to reflect on our lives and if we notice we are still carrying emotional baggage from our past we need to “put it down”; let go and move on with our lives.