A young mother looked down at her newborn, with love streaming from her eyes, and said, “I wish I could hear you speak. I wish I understood what you are thinking just now. Can’t you talk to me, tell me what you are thinking?” Then she chuckled at her own foolishness, and gave her baby a gentle hug.
One day, when the baby was six months old, and Anna was doing the laundry, there appeared a shining white angel. Anna was surprised to find that she was neither scared nor amazed. She looked at the angel, and said in delight, as though meeting a dear friend after many long years, “What are you doing here?”
The angel grinned, and said “Would you like me to wait for you in the kitchen instead?”
“No! What are you doing here?”
“I have come here to answer your greatest wish.”
“I haven’t made any wish. All my wishes have come true now that I have the most beautiful baby in the world.”
“Really?” questioned the angel. “Don’t you wish to hear your baby talk to you? Haven’t you asked this of God again and again?”
“Yes!”
“Well, I have come to grant you this wish. Tomorrow, at this time, you can talk to your baby, and your baby shall talk to you.”
So saying, the angel vanished.
Anna was agog with excitement. She replayed the words over and over in her mind, “Your baby shall talk to you.” 24 hours seemed to crawl by. She wondered, “what should I tell my baby? Should I tell him about the physical dangers, so that he can take care and be safe? Maybe, I should tell my baby about heartbreak, and loneliness, and lost relationships, and how, though we may not believe it at the time, we have the strength to survive through all such emotional challenges. Or, should I talk to my baby about money, and how it is significant, but not the most important thing in the world? Or would it be better to explain to him the truths and myths of religion and philosophy?” That night she couldn’t sleep, and it seemed as though the hands on the clock dawdled painfully, lingering over each minute far longer than they should.
The next day, at the appointed moment, the angel reappeared. He found the mother and son in deep embrace. Softly he said, “Anna, you have half an hour. You can say whatever you wish to your baby, but there are conditions. You are allowed only to answer, and, baby, you are permitted only to ask questions. Three questions. No more.”
Anna’s smile faded. This was completely unexpected. She prayed from deep within that her baby would ask her the right questions so that she could impart all that she had prepared to tell him.
The angel left, and the baby opened its eyes, stood up, and said “Hello, my beloved mother, I am so joyous, that I have this moment to talk with you.” Anna embraced her baby, and said, “Ask me, little one. Let us not waste any time; we have only a precious half hour.” With eyes filled with wonder, he spoke, “When you take me out in the garden, I look up at the sky, and I see that it is a brilliant blue. Why is the sky blue, mother?”
Anna felt her heart sink; he had wasted one question. “Why is the sky blue? Is this going to be the conversation we have?” she thought. But she smiled very lovingly, and gave him the scientific reason of light rays, and how they bend …………….
The baby listened with deep concentration, nodding occasionally, and when Anna was silent again, he asked, “Mother, sometimes when you take me out, it is very hot outside, and at other times it turns cold. Why is it hot sometimes, and cold at other times?”
Anna’s heart sank even deeper, “Will my baby give me no chance to impart to him all the wisdom that I have in my heart?” But she continued to smile, and explained about the earth and the sun, and the tilting of the Earth on its axis, and weather and climate. Through this explanation, though, she was silently willing the little one to make the third and last question count.
The little one asked one last time, “Mother, why is it that sometimes I feel the wind blow, but at other times it is completely still?”
Three questions had been asked, and Anna had had no opportunity to tell her little one about the things that she considered truly significant for him live a joyous life.
At the end of the half hour, the angel appeared. Anna was annoyed. “Is this the conversation that you permitted me? I wanted to impart to him truths and wisdom that could enlighten him. You told me that my son would talk to me with an intellect of an adult, but he asked me all the questions that a child would. Did you lie to me?”
“Angels don’t lie, dear Anna. Your son did speak to you with the intellect of an adult, and that is why he understood all the scientific and geographical knowledge that you shared with him. But the questions that your son asked arose out of his limited experience of six months on Earth. Listen to me carefully, Anna. This is true of your conversation with God, too, isn’t it? The questions you ask - ‘why can I not be as rich as my neighbour?’ - ‘why is this challenging person in my life?’- ‘why does God permit suffering in the world?’ – these, and other such questions, you ask out of your limited consciousness of what IS. If the baby had asked you, ‘Mother, what is it that you wish to tell me?’ would you not have had the opportunity to truly enlighten your child? This is true of your relationship with the Divine Universe as well, dear Anna. When you ask God to tell you all that God wishes to tell you, you shall receive gifts that you have not yet imagined. When you ask God to tell you what you wish to hear, you lose the opportunity to enlighten yourself.”
Two silent tears rolled down Anna’s cheeks as she bowed her head, and joined her hands in deep gratitude for the blessing of enlightenment that she had just received. She looked up to say ‘I love you’ to the wise angel, but all she saw was a shaft of golden light that washed over her baby and her.
(Inspired by a parable of Kryon)