The Wolves Within (The Holy Bag Part 2)

We watched a DVD last night called "The Pursuit of Happyness"-if you have seen the film you will understand why happiness is misspelt- and it got me thinking about one of my previous posts called "The Holy Bag". I remembered an e-mail that a friend of ours, Rory, sent around one New Years. It was a parable told by a Cherokee Indian about two wolves and I thought the message was similar to that of the Dalai Lama's.

I couldn't find the original e-mail so I literally typed in "two wolves fighting inside me" and got a load of hits with the parable therein. The Internet is just incredible. Here's the parable.


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."


There's even another version of the story which is even closer to the parable told by the Dalai Lama here.

Perhaps the Dalai Lama was a Cherokee Indian in a former life?

Cathal