raising your little elephant

Chapter One- The Elephant in the Room

You may have heard a story when you were young about a group of blind men who came upon an elephant one day. I believe this story originates from India. Now as the story goes these six blind individuals were born blind, and so they have never seen an elephant before. For the sake of our story, we will not let the elephant make any noise. This elephant will also remain calm as these six interlopers in the room examine his various features.

The first man approaches the trunk of the elephant and perceives it has the properties of a snake. The second locates the ear and says it is like a fan (such as might be made from a palm frond). Another man has his hand on the pillar-like leg of the pachyderm and concludes he is touching a tree trunk. The fourth man in succession places his hand on the elephant's side and discovers he is in the presence of a massive wall. The next man takes hold of the creature's tail and exclaims it is like a rope. Finally, our sixth sightless investigator discovers a sharp spear at the end of the tusk of this quite confusing beast.

These seeming contradictions create quite a verbal disagreement among this panelist of experts. As the story continues a seventh man now appears on the scene. This fellow, however, has a very significant advantage over his fellow experts. You see unlike the other six this man has the gift of sight. With this added feature present, this man holds the key to uniting all the seeming contradictions among his fellow investigators. Our seventh man can see how all these men have described various aspects of this enormous animal. However, he can also see how all these different parts make a very interesting whole. Sadly, because these men cannot see the big picture, they will either humbly accept what panelist number seven is saying, or resist believing him since they will only believe what they can test with empirical evidence.

Ironically, in this case seeing is relative since they all hold part of the key. They just need to stop arguing about who is right and accept that they may all be partially right in their own estimations. One way to do this is to share experiences by rotating around the elephant until each of them has had the opportunity to explore what the others felt. Once they do, they may have a chance of seeing what the man with insight was telling them all along. None of this however is possible unless they swallow their individual pride.

This must have been what it was like for Jesus of Nazareth while he attempted to explain the challenges that people face in life, to the twelve men, and great crowds that he encountered as he tried to expose the true elephant in the room that no one else could see but him. It was everywhere he looked. It was holding most people back from seeing the real him. He needed to find a way to open the eyes of the mentally blind people with whom he kept company. He would only have about three and a half years to reach his goal. He didn't need everyone woke to this new understanding within that time period, but he would need at least some to make these connections in order for them to spread the good news that hope was on the horizon that no one could even see.

Many today are roving about looking for answers to the many problems we have in life. Problems are easy to identify. Finding someone to blame is also easy. Figuring out what is at the center of all these difficulties is quite challenging. That's why I am writing this book. You see unless the human race wakes up to the real elephant in the room as it were there will be no unity, no peace, and no hope for anyone. Everything that we think is the problem are just symptoms of a much bigger issue. Experts today are discovering amazing things as they explore the various aspects of the human condition. These modern-day panelists usually have the five senses needed to discover the whole story; however personal biases will often blind these same great minds to seeing a deeper truth because it challenges certain concepts that they may hold dear.

You see, dear reader we are not only examining a figurative elephant in this room. We are all sitting on top of our own personal elephant as well. We may be quite comfortable up on our perch. We may have spent years feeding our great beast. We may have decorated it with the finest jewels. Do you have any idea how hard it is to examine anything while sitting on top of an enormous animal such as this? With this expanded understanding we can imagine that our personal elephant is becoming quite agitated as it is pressed up against by the other six jumbo sized creatures in the room.

If you realized these six blind men were studying this seventh beast from such high perches you may have put a stop to this experiment immediately and called PETA. However, the reason you didn't see this is because my friend, as you look down, I want you to feel what is directly below you. Yes, I am sorry to be the one to inform you of this. You are also sitting on your own personal pachyderm, and so am I. Now I don't want you to panic. You have been up here for years. You just couldn't see it before because like everyone else, you are blind. Before you get all bent out of shape about it, I want you to know that I am also blind just like you.

Now you might be wondering how I know all this if I am also blind. Well, it's quite simple. Remember panelist number seven who can see. Well, I decided to listen to him and once I started compiling all the other panelist's data it became quite clear that we have no idea how much we actually are not seeing. It is very easy to discover someone else has elevated themselves. It is very difficult to discover it in our own case because we cannot look up or down. We can discern up and down through hearing, but some people have discovered how to throw their voice like a ventriloquist to create the audio illusion that they are above us or even below us. We may also have this misleading skill and even use it on others.
We all have the ability to discover this amazing truth, but it is only the beginning of the greatest human experience that we will ever have.

When you discover that you are not above anyone or below anyone you will be one step closer to seeing the truth about the human condition. I invite you to join me as we explore this through the pages of this publication. This figurative elephant is the key to unlocking our true potential. In the next chapter we will climb down from this colossal animal and examine with brand new eyes the height, and breadth, and depth of this part of ourselves we didn't even know was there.