One day the father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country. He wanted to show his son how poor people live. They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a poor family.
On their return from their trip, the father asked his son, “How was the trip?” “It was great, Dad.” “Did you see how poor people can be?” the father asked. “Oh yes,” said the son. “So what did you learn from the trip?” asked the father.
The son answered, “I saw that we have one dog and they have four. We have a pool that reaches to the middle of the garden and they have a stream that has no end. We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night. Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.
“We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight. We have people who serve us, but they serve others. We buy our food, but they grow theirs. We have walls around our property, but they have friends to protect them.”
With this the boy’s father was speechless. Then his son added, “Thanks Dad, for showing me how poor we are.”
This is a nice story but like many similar tidbits, most people take it the wrong way and think it’s saying being rich is a real drag, and being poor really meaningful and wonderful. I think we would all agree that having not enough money creates most of the stress and heartache in our lives as opposed to having too much. To be quite frank about it, I don’t know if there’s a defining message in this story the way it is written. Maybe the message is The best things in life aren’t things, which I agree with. Or maybe it’s Even when you’re poor you still have many things to be thankful for. But I guess the farm was a poor example of poverty. Living underneath a bridge and not being able to feed your kids would be more characteristic of poverty and then where would the analogy be. To some people, this story is just one of those things that poor people like to read because it makes rich people look miserable, and trust me, most of them aren’t. They just worked a lot harder and smarter than most others are willing.
First of all, thank you for commenting. I am neither rich, nor poor, so I can’t speak for either one of them.
This story was meant to give a different perspective on how we look at things. Some see good, while others see bad on the same things/stories/happenings.
I am hoping that someone stopping by here, and reading this story, will be encouraged to look at the bright side of things, even if for only a quick moment.