The Habit Trap

A village was once attacked by wild boars.Every day the wild boars would enter to rampage the food supplies of the village. The villagers tried various means to fight and chase away the wild boars, but without much success.

One day a wise man approached the village headman to offer his advice. He told the villagers that they would need to follow all his advice and directions. Out of desperation, the villagers agreed. The wise man told the villagers to gather all the food from every household and put it in the middle of a big empty field.

They followed his advice and immediately saw hundreds of wild boars approaching the vicinity where the food was placed. The wild boars were apprehensive initially, but after a while they went for the food. Once the wild boars had a taste of the food, they came back for their free meal every day. And every day the villagers would put more food in the field and the wild boars would come to have their free meals. 

After a while, the wise man asked the villagers to erect four poles at the four corners of the field.The wild boars were too busy having their food that they did not take notice of what was happening. After a few weeks, the wild boars developed a habit of eating free food. The wise man then asked the villagers to put fencing around the field, with a large gate through which the wild boars could enter to have their food.

Finally, once the fencing and the gate were completed the villagers closed the gate and all the wild boars were trapped inside the field. The wild boars were finally defeated!

Habits are easily developed but difficult to get rid of. The wild boars were trapped because out of their greed, they developed a habit of eating free food, without having to work for it. They became so comfortable that they did not realize that they were being trapped.

Most of us are like the wild boars because we become so comfortable with our materialistic activities that we do not realize we are in one way or another being "trapped". We seek security rather than freedom!