The Touchstone

The following story is a great reminder for all of us to slow down and pay more attention to life, so that we can recognize and take advantage of opportunities as they cross our path.

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When the great library of Alexandria burned, the story goes, one book was saved. But it was not a valuable book; and so a poor man, who could read a little, bought it for coppers.

The book wasn’t very interesting; but between its pages there was something very interesting indeed. It was a thin strip of vellum on which was written the secret of the “Touchstone.”

The touchstone was a small pebble that could turn any common metal into pure gold. The writing explained that it was lying among the thousands and thousands of other pebbles that looked exactly the same. But the secret was this: The real stone would feel warm, while the ordinary pebbles would be cold.

So the man sold his few belongings, bought some simple supplies, camped on the seashore and began testing pebbles.

He knew that if he picked up ordinary pebbles and threw them down again because they were cold, he might pick up the same pebble hundreds of times. So, when he felt a pebble that was cold, he threw it into the sea. He spent a whole day doing this but none of the pebbles he picked up was the touchstone. Cold, throw it into the sea. Pick up another, throw it into the sea.

The days stretched into weeks and the weeks into months. However, one day about mid-afternoon the man picked up a pebble and it was warm. But he threw it into the sea before he realized what he had done. He had formed such a strong habit of throwing each pebble into the sea that when the one he wanted came along, he still threw it away.

So it is with opportunity. Unless we are vigilant, it’s easy to fail to recognize an opportunity when it is in our hand and it’s just as easy to throw it away.

Author Unknown
Bits & Pieces
Economic Press

Sometimes we stare so long at a door that is closing that we see too late the one that is open. Alexander Graham Bell