A man encountered Sophia at the market selling used books. As he searched through a pile, Sophia reached below the table, pulled out an old book with a ratty cover, and when certain no one was watching, whispered, “Try this one. It is a treasure.”
The man bought it for a few pennies, took it home, read it, and to his surprise, on the inside back cover he found scribbled in tiny letters a few sentences, a brief description, about a magic stone that could turn anything it touched into pure gold. According to the book, the stone was lying somewhere on the shore of the Black Sea among a million other pebbles that looked just like it. The one difference was that the magic stone was warm to the touch whereas all others were cold.
The man set up a tent on the shore and went to work. Each stone he picked up, if it was cold to the touch, he threw it far into the sea so that he wouldn’t keep picking up the same stones.
Stone after stone, he picked each up, felt it, and hurled it deep into the water. Stone after stone…
He worked a week, a month, ten months, a whole year, patiently feeling each stone and tossing it into the sea.
Then, one evening, he picked up a pebble, and it was warm to the touch! Through sheer force of habit, he threw it far out into the water.
In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you. Leo Tolstoy
