The light, manageable burden of love

 

Osho tells a beautiful story of a sanyasi named Bhavani Dayal. He was on a pilgrimage in the Himalayas. It was a very hot noon and he was moving up the hill with his bedroll on his shoulder. The sanyasi was sweating and breathless because of the weight and the steep climb. In front of him, a small hill girl was carrying her brother on her shoulders. She herself was very young and that is why she was also struggling, panting and sweating. All breathless, the sanyasi said to her, ‘Daughter you must be feeling a lot of burden and weight on you.’ The girl said, ‘Swami ji the weight and burden is on you. Your bundle. I carry no weight. He is not a burden, he is my brother.’ The sanyasi was shocked. A small hill girl taught him a big lesson of life. Where there is love, there is no burden in life. It was joyful for her to carry the physical weight of a little brother, while he joylessly struggled under the physical weight of his belongings.