Two Wolves

A Cherokee Legend

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. "A fight is going on inside me," he said to the boy.

"It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego." He continued, "The other is good - he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf will win?"

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

Probably heard this at some time, but never thought about it. If you were raised as a kid in the 50's and attended church, you had a pretty good idea of what was right and what was not. But that is not exactly true. You had a pretty good idea of what moral society said was right and what was not. I loved it.

You got on the bus on Monday morning and every kid there had been to church the day before. You never did anything on Sunday because nothing was open that day. You did get to play outside but that was usually because your mother wanted a nap.

But you see I was a kid, and pretty much didn't bother with anything out of my scope of self. I did not know that Mrs. Jones was a secret alcoholic. Or Mr. Lester the scoutmaster was a little too friendly with the boys. Or Widow Barnes had a few too many late night callers. Out of sight more or less made it only slightly out of right. It's a new day. Our sins are much the same, just more out in the open. And society has deemed them less embarrassing.

So why did reading this simple story seem like a slap in the face? I literally had not even thought about having these two wolves, but I do. Most of my life I did most the right things and refrained from doing most of the bad things, so was this battle one I guess I felt I had won? The greater light bulb going off in my mind is that it is I can literally not win. No matter how good I try to be. As long as I am human and live on this planet Earth, the war wages.

True, prayerful confession is not merely tatteling on the bad wolf as much as it is encouraging the good one. How critical is it that I feed the good one with what I take in - whether it be visual, auditory, emotional, or sensual. The bad one is there and it too will demand to be fed, because as much as I wish he did not live in me, he does. On good days, he just gets table scraps, but there are occasions when he gets the choicest cuts of meat.

And I haven't had a pet in almost 30 years! Well, I guess I need to get some books on wolf behavior. Woops, there I go again!