TAMERLANE AND THE ANT
With dried blood and dirt in his mouth he dared breathe only the quietest of breaths, as he lay frozen midst the stone rubble. Only a partial wall now remained that sheltered him from the many enemy eyes that were still slowly picking their way through the corpse-strewn battlefield in search of stragglers. …If he could continue to stay undiscovered for perhaps one more hour he just might be able to steal away under the cloak of the approaching darkness.
It was just then that he saw her, only a few inches from his grounded face. Like a colossal god of power, with strength beyond imagining, relative to her size, she hoisted the 50 times body weight prize over her head and began the vertical climb straight up the wall.
After gaining only a few hard fought inches nature’s laws uncaringly slammed her back down into the dust. Undeterred, the tiny ant retrieved her colossal kernel of corn and attacked the wall a second time. Up she went tenaciously battling and staggering for each unwilling inch. But down she fell again.
Again and again she fell. Again and again she picked up her treasure and made for the unrelenting wall. By now he was mesmerized by the unshakable will of his miniature companion. He counted. Eleven! …Twenty-three! …Forty times! It was beyond anything he could ever have imagined. And yet, there she was still going at it; and against an obviously impossible set of circumstances.
An hour passed and the sun was now beginning to release its reign over the central Asian sky. But on she went. Sixty times! …. Sixty-nine times! And then… it happened.
On her seventieth try she didn’t fall. She defied gravity, and man’s disbelief, and pushed her prize up onto the top of the wall just as the last rays of the sun reflected golden light from her hard earned treasure. …In the next instant… she was gone. She was down the other side and away to her self-made destiny.
The intensity of everything Tamerlane had experienced that day burned like fire in his mind; the searing defeat, the cold breath of death blowing over him. And in that state of heightened awareness the greatest lesson that he would take from this battlefield was provided by the little ant with her golden kernel of corn. Perseverance!
Tamerlane now knew that Perseverance was the golden key to his future. He had seen its power with his own eyes. Regrouping after this defeat, and a number of others that life would deal him, Tamerlane would eventually go on to conquer huge portions of his fourteenth century world, which included vast areas of western and central Asia, founding the Timurid Dynasty that would endure for over four hundred years as the Mughal Empire of India!
And so there it is, one of the most vital keys to self-evolution and the successful accomplishment of every desire in your heart. Think about this power of fortitude, tenacity and perseverance in this lowly ant. Stunning, isn’t it?!
Yet, we see this quality of perseverance being expressed everywhere in nature, from the oceans unrelentingly pounding on rocky shores, to its many expressions in plants, animals, and finally in mankind.
Does it seem as obvious to you, as it does to me, that The Universal Intelligence is giving us constant demonstrations of how each of us can fulfill our worthwhile desires? Life is trying to teach each of us that we must first build our psychological and spiritual muscles so that we learn how to persevere in our efforts for as long as may be necessary to achieve our worthy goals.
And then with the power of your unbreakable resolve you will gain the staying power you need to take yourself forward over all the unseen mountains of soul learning that yet lie ahead, and through all the swamps of errors, bad habits, disbelief and indifference until at last you conquer the final enemy, your ego, and emerge the Soul victor of all that your life is asking of you!
