“ Beautiful skins are all the same, an interesting soul is one in a million!”
Shakyamuni Buddha (Gautama Buddha)
The Four Wives
The Second Wife
Buddha’s Life Lessons -The Four Wives “The Second Wife’ | Wisdom | Spirituality
Shakyamuni Buddha in one of his teachings to his disciples used the example of a businessman that was married to four wives: The first wife was smart and cute, and accompanied him like a shadow; the second wife was snatched by him, beautiful and enviable; The third wife, was taking care of his daily chores, not let him worry about life; the fourth wife, was the busiest all day, but he didn’t know what she was busy with.
The businessman was going to travel far, and because of the hard journey, he asked which wife was willing to accompany him.
The second wife said: “I was taken from you by force, and I won’t go either!”
Shakyamuni Buddha said to everyone, “Do you understand? The second wife is also you!”
The second wife refers to money. Many people work for money all their lives, but they won’t carry anything after death. It is nothing more than fishing for the moon.
Another version of this story is that there was a king who had four wives and he was on his deathbed. He was afraid of being alone in the afterlife, so he asked the wives one by one: “Would you die with me, will you come with me to the afterlife?”
The second wife, who he was so proud of and showed her to everybody in neighboring kingdoms replied: “I love my life so much, I am sorry, I cannot go with you. When you die, I am going to remarry!”
The second wife represents money and our possessions. All our life we spend so much time trying to gather anything one can possibly imagine but, in the end, they cannot come with us to the afterlife. All our belongings will be given to other people and/or divided. This is why the second wife said “I am going to remarry”.
Commentaries:
Does this mean that you mustn’t have anything, that you should renounce everything? The possession in itself is not bad at all, but your craving for it, is the one that disconnects you from what is important and what is not. Every possession is a toy for you to play with. A toy can give you glimpses of a temporary nice time, play with it but it won’t bring you happiness.
Happiness comes from within, what comes after understanding, after realization is real, non-affected by external factors Happiness. Happiness is a state of mind that comes from realization and it is not a thing.
All the enlightened masters that came on this earth tried so hard to teach humanity not to get attached, but that doesn’t mean you have to live inside a cage, if you do this you will miss life. Attend life, get involved with life just remember that one day you will have to go and nothing of these will exist, why waste time suffering for possessions or situations.
Once you are gone, nothing is important. Having a mindset like that keeps you on track of what is really important in life.
There is a high misconception in spiritual thinking that if you renounce everything you will rank higher in the spiritual world or that it will add to your spiritual journey. At the same time, there is a high misconception in the materialistic thinking that you can find happiness through possessions.
Don’t renounce the time that was given to you because you will miss life, attend life, get involved with life, and learn. We’re here to learn and then move on.
Don’t wallow in material enjoyment, live and practice. The Way of a person is at the center of his heart, impartial, neither Yin nor Yang. Balance is everything!
Don’t get attached because one day you will have to leave everything behind and move on.
Play with your possessions, enjoy them but do not take them as the only reality, because this reality will cease to exist when you leave this body behind, nothing is permanent, everything is constantly changing, transforming, and evolving, and that my friends is the only reality. There is something real that doesn’t die but only transforms, that exists forever and that is your soul incarnating to different but not permanent realities.
The story continues in the next article!
Thanks for reading!
The First Wife-Shakyamuni Buddha
The Third Wife-Shakyamuni Buddha
The Fourth Wife-Shakyamuni Buddha
Watch the video of this blog post on Youtube