Short story: It sometimes takes two to solve a koan

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The Zen master, Ryoto Domlas, put this koan to his students. The one who answered it best was to move out, and to become the head of a new Zen monastery nearby. "If two monks are arguing about whether a stone is too heavy to be lifted by either of them, who else could lift it?" The student who answered it best, said rather arrogantly, but truly: "I could lift it, with the help of the other two. Team effort wins over individual effort, sometimes." "Yes," said the old master, "You will need to work as a team with your students, and not lord it over them. I have selected you for the task." "The sun of the self shines best on other selves." The Student went, and became the head of the new monastery, and soon he had a whole monastery of students too. His arrogance had turned into gentleness. He taught well, and he never forgot not to hide his inner self, but to shine it over his students to help them to see better the light, in their current state of darkness. Togetherness has more strength than solitariness. Photo Credit: The photo used in this article was sourced from the free media site, pixabay.com (Picture: This was the Zen monastery that the new monk now presided over.)