The Story of Three Arrows

Once there was a boy named Davinci who loved to be outside. One sunny afternoon, he was running through a field of tall grass. The wind was cool, the birds were singing, and Davinci felt like the whole world was his friend. He was so happy that he didn't have a single worry in his head.

Suddenly, Davinci's foot hit a hidden stone. He tumbled forward and landed hard on the dusty path. "Ouch!" he cried. His knee was scraped and stinging. This was the First Arrow. It was the physical pain that just happens in life. It hurt, and it was nobody's fault, but it was real.

Davinci sat on the ground and looked at his knee. He started to feel very angry. "Why did that rock have to be there?" he shouted. "This is a terrible day! Everything is ruined!" This was the Second Arrow. By getting angry and resisting the pain, Davinci made his heart hurt as much as his knee pain.

Davinci limped back to his house. He didn't want to feel the pain in his knee, and he didn't want to feel the anger and suffering in his heart. He wanted the bad feelings to go away right now. He stomped into the kitchen, looking for something anything—to help him forget about his bad day.

Davinci found a big jar of chocolate cookies and ate ten of them very fast. Then he slumped onto the sofa and turned on a glowing screen to watch loud cartoons. This was the Third Arrow. He was using bad habits to hide from his feelings instead of facing them.

As the sun began to set, Davinci's knee still hurt. But now, his tummy ached from the cookies, and his eyes felt itchy and tired from the screen. He felt even more sufferings than before. The Third Arrow had not fixed his pain; it had only added a new "bad-feeling hangover" to his day.

Just then, his neighbor Cong-Min knocked on the door. Cong-Min was a wise man who knew how to listen. He saw the empty jar and the dark room and sat down quietly on the rug. "It looks like you've been hit by a few arrows today, Davinci," Cong-Min said in a gentle voice.

Cong-Min explained, "The First Arrow is the pain of the fall. We cannot stop that. But the Second Arrow is the anger we fire at ourselves. And the Third Arrow is the way we try to hide with sugar and screens. We fire those last two arrows ourselves, but we can also choose to stop."

"What do I do instead?" Davinci asked. Cong-Min smiled. "Try Wise Self-Care. Instead of watching videos, read a book to calm your mind. Go for a gentle walk to move your body. And when you are tired, get enough sleep to let your body heal. These actions help the arrows fall away."

Davinci stood up and washed his face. He put the cookies away and felt better. He went for a slow walk to watch the sunset. The First Arrow still stung a little, but the anger and the "sugar-fog" and “screen-addiction” were gone. Davinci felt brave, calm, and ready for a new day.