25 Stories to Feed Your Mind

By Ehsan Havazadeh

Like our body, our mind needs to be fed and enriched. Don't let your mind starve and for the price of a coffee feed your mind with 25 moral stories. These stories can help you gain a better understanding of your surrounding world and lead to living a better life.

25 Stories to feed your mind reflects on the book Masnavi Manavi, written by Rumi.
Rumi was a poet, author, and philosopher who lived in the 13th century. The book Masnavi Manavi is one of the works of this powerful author whose mystical and moral themes are conveyed within instructive stories presented in the form of poetry. This book is a selection of Masnavi Manavi stories in poetry that I have digested and translated this book to English as fluent prose. At the end of each story is a brief reflection. These contain observations from other books written about Rumi's work, as well as my interpretations of the stories. It should be noted that some points have been added in the descriptions of the stories that may not have been considered by Rumi, but I mentioned them in the description of stories and hope they are useful to my readers. The book Masnavi Manavi has deep moral and mystical meanings and Rumi has tried to convey them like a capable teacher. In this book, I have only considered the basic level of these concepts and have tried to reduce the complexity and depth of the content as much as possible. My goal is to provide an easy read so that a greater audience can become acquainted with this ethics instructor.
Rumi's ability to bring influential points to life in the form of stories helps us to memorize these moral concepts more quickly and to recall them more easily when needed. This book's illustrations can also help to memorize and recall the stories from your visual memory. The illustration method can help to remember the stories faster than other books.
There are some hidden points in this book. Intentionally I didn't try to clarify, so the reader has the opportunity to research and find the intentions. Also, some stories have open end or not fully described to let the reader research or decide about conclusions.
I hope my efforts are entertaining and informative for you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ehsan Havazadeh
• Release date: Aug 17, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215175705

Book preview

1. Friendship with a Bear

Adragon grabbed a bear and wanted to kill and eat it. The bear shouted and asked for help, and a hero went closer to see if he could save the bear from the dragon. When the bear saw the hero approaching, the bear started begging for help. I will be your servant and I will come with you wherever you go, the bear said to the hero. The hero fought and defeated the dragon and released the bear. The bear appreciated the hero and said, You are my friend now and I will follow wherever you go. The two went together until they got somewhere that they could rest, the hero was tired and wanted to sleep. The bear said, Sleep well. I am your guard.

A man was passing by and asked the hero, What is this bear doing with you?

The hero replied, I saved him and he became my friend.

The man said, Do not get a bear as a friend, that is worse than a thousand enemies.

The hero responded, You are jealous. The bear is my friend, I helped him. He would not betray me.

The man said, The friendship and love of fools deceive man. Release him, because he is dangerous.

The hero sighed, Oh man, leave me alone, you are jealous.

The man said, My heart says that this bear will do you great harm.

The hero didn’t listen to the man and turned him away. The hero fell asleep and a fly sat on his face. Seeing this, the bear hit the fly with his hand. The fly sat down again and the bear hit it several times, but the fly did not go away. The bear became angry and picked up a large stone from the mountain, and as soon as the fly landed on the hero's again, the bear used a large stone to strike the hero's face and destroyed the man's head.

Reflection:

Friendship

The importance of friendship and the effects of friends on our life are mentioned in this simple story. There is also is a hidden impression here.  The surface impression points us to choose our friends carefully. Many times, we believe some people are not going to hurt our life and our lifestyle. Real friends have lots of signs that identify them as such, and this story doesn’t plan to explain all those details. It just scratches the surface and points us to do deeper research about how we can find who is not a proper friend for us.

The friendship of an ignorant person is like the friendship of the bear. His enmity and friendship are the same and both could hurt you. True friends work like a mirror. A mirror never lies to you and it has honest feedback in its heart.

As mentioned, this story also has a deeper interpretation that Rumi tried to make us aware of. In this story the hero represents humans, bears represent our desires and the traveler represents teachers, true books, and perfect humans that give us advice. If you choose desire as your friend, the story of your life will have a sad ending. Some desires look harmless but in real-life, we will realize their impacts when it might be too late. For example, greediness may look like the way to have a more comfortable life but after we spend part of life accruing money, we will realize we didn’t spend enough time looking after our family and friends.

2. Deaf Man Visits his Sick Neighbor

There was a deaf man who wanted to visit his sick neighbor. He said to himself, I am deaf. How can I hear the patient and talk to him? He is sick and his voice is weak. His lips moves when he is talking, so I can guess what he will say.

So, the deaf man prepared a conversation in his mind. Like:

I say: How are you? He will say: Well, thank God I'm better.

I say: Thank God, what have you eaten? He will say: Soup or medicine.

I say: Good for you. Who is your doctor? He will name a doctor.

I say: He is