The Blind Men and the Elephant

A Story about Perspective

In a parable, six blind men were challenged to describe an elephant accurately. To add to the challenge, each man was taken to the elephant alone and allowed to touch only one area of the animal.

When they were asked to describe the elephant they each have a completely different perspective.

One blind man grabs the tusk and says, “An elephant is like a spear!”

Another feels the trunk and concludes, “An elephant is like a snake!”

The third blind man hugging the leg thinks, “An elephant is like a tree!”

The one holding the tail claims, “An elephant is like a rope!”

Another feeling the ear believes, “An elephant is like a fan!”

The last blind man leaning on the elephant’s side exclaims, “An elephant is like a wall!”

Because each man was trapped in his own limited perception, none of the six were able to form a clear mental picture of the elephant.

( Moral of the story: Truth is vast but our understanding is small. And our experience is rarely the whole truth.

In daily life, we’re often like those blind men – arguing from our limited view, clinging to our small pieces of truth, forgetting that others hold pieces too. In doing so, we forget the larger picture.

Every person sees life from their own angle. Don’t fight to prove your view – seek to understand the whole. Only when we open our hearts to understand another’s, only when the fragments come together, does truth reveal its full shape – and wisdom begins to speak.

Knowledge and wisdom grow when understanding becomes greater than opinion. Before judging, pause and ask: What part am I not seeing?)