The Bucket Parable

Many years ago, there was a man who was a water carrier. A pole on his shoulder, a bucket on the right, and a bucket on the left. For years and years, the water carrier would wake up early in the morning, fill the buckets, walk several kilometers to town, sit in the town square, sell the water, earn a few liras, and return home. Over the years, a hole formed in the water carrier's left bucket, and the water began to drip out. But, the water carrier himself doesn't notice. He doesn't feel that the bucket is leaking. He works with it as usual, as if the bucket is perfectly fine. A few more years go by, the hole grows so large, the water drips so much that in the end he would fill two buckets, but arrive in town with only 1 and 1/2. Half a bucket would leak out along the way. And amazingly, the water carrier doesn't replace the bucket. And so, as the story goes, one bright day the bucket opened its mouth and said to him, "Master water carrier, I don't understand you. Don't you see the defect? Don't you see that I'm leaking? Throw me away. Go to the hardware store, buy a new bucket. Fill two, sell two, you'll make more profit. What good does it do you, sir, that you fill two buckets, but end up with only 1 and 1/2?" The water carrier looked at the bucket and said, "My dear bucket, I don't like to replace you." He asked him, "Why? But, I have a defect. I only bring you half the goods." He said to him, "Let me explain to you. If you've noticed, every morning when I fill you and your friend and walk to town, you're always on my left side and you drip, and I do see that. At night, when I finish selling the water and return to my wife and children, I discover that along the path your dripping has made flowers grow. Every night, I pick the flowers and give my wife a big bouquet. I will never replace you, my precious bucket. It's good for me that you drip. Your dripping makes things grow for me." This parable is the parable of our lives. Is anyone perfect? Is there any bucket here without leaks? Are you perfect? Are you perfect? No. We are not perfect. But you know what? The wisdom in a relationship is not to replace the bucket. In other words, not to get divorced and take a new bucket. Why? Because this bucket has a hole. The next bucket doesn't have a handle. It doesn't have a handle. So, maybe it'll be better in some other way. What are you going to replace with what? After all, there's no perfect person. So, what are you exchanging for what? A problem for a problem? Whoever notices this insight realizes on the contrary, I live with my own bucket. I have a husband, I have a wife, they have their drips. The art of a relationship is to see how the dripping grows flowers.