“I want to settle down in this city. Are the people here nice?” the weary traveller asked the shopkeeper.
The shopkeeper looked at him carefully, and then asked kindly, “What is your name? Where are you from? Why do you want to settle in a new city?”
“I am a merchant. I want to seek fortune in a new city because the city I was in was full of angry, quarrelsome, mean people.”
The shopkeeper shook his head in dismay, “Oh, my friend, you will not find joy here. The people of this city are even more angry and mean than any city you would have left behind.”
The listener picked up his bags and hastily exited the city, in search of a more peaceful realm.
A few hours later, another travelling merchant asked the shopkeeper the same question.
The shopkeeper asked him about his antecedents too.
“Oh, I come from a wonderful city. The people were very nice.”
“Then, my friend, by all means, make this city your home. Here, you will find the nicest, kindest human beings.”
An observer sitting at the shop had seen both these exchanges. Perplexed, he turned to the shopkeeper and asked, “Why did you give opposite advice to the two people asking you the exact same question?”
With a twinkle in his eye, the shopkeeper replied, “We see the world, not as it is, but as we are. The first person would have found people quarrelsome and mean wherever he went.
The second saw the good in people. He would have seen the world as a good place, wherever he went. I want the second kind in my city – the people who love, the people who shine the bright light of kindness.”