The sage with two horns is a book written by author Sudha Murthy. She is one of the famous author and wrote many novels, books and short stories. The book is based on mythological stories and anyone from younger to older generation can go through the book.

Below are the few lessons we can learn from the book.

Righteous path

Righteous path is the path of truthfulness, integrity and honesty. A good life needs all of it. It needs a lot of willpower to follow the path of righteousness as it demands sacrifice and willingness to face challenges. It is always better to choose Righteousness over rewards.

Read: Success and fear- two sides of same coin

Morality

Since ages there are two ways of leading a life-
You can either be moral or immoral. Morality is the divine truth of life. A person is wise when he has moral values. You can have all the money, power and fame in life but peace lacks without moral and ethics. It cannot be bought with money but when we have a percent of it, we see the life, the way it is. We experience life, we become compassionate and empathetic. We start loving ourselves and others.

Other part of river is always green

In this decade, when we see the life of people in social media, we feel their life is far better than us. I read a story in this book where there is a conversation between Krishna and Karna. While Karna was upset that he was left abandoned right after birth, Krishna’s life was no different. He was born in jail and death was awaiting him.

When Krishna said the same to Karna, Karna said that he is a very normal human being unlike God Krishna. But Krishna pointed out the positive sides of Karna, how Karna acquired great skills to become one of the greatest warrior and how  lucky he is to be the student of Parshuram.

The story shows how positivity should be implemented in life. I read somewhere that we fail to look at the positive sides of life because we keep on staring at the closed doors of life when other door of hope is already open. Life becomes the way we look at it.

Faith and belief

What is faith or belief? Basically faith or belief, both are same. They are the conviction of our intellect. In this book, I read about Dhruva. Dhruva, the young child of King Uttanapada is one of the greatest devotee of Lord Krishna. When he lacked affection of his father, he went straight to his mother. His mother didn’t said anything but mentioned that only Krishna can change the mind of his father. It was enough for Dhruv to be convinced that he must pray to Krishna to gain affection of his father. At such young age, he abandoned the palace and went to a jungle to pray and penace for Lord Krishna. However, when he saw Lord Krishna, he didn’t ask anything but to be with him. Krishna was so pleased that he named a star after his name.

Dhruv star or pole star which we observe in sky at night still shows us the right direction when we are lost. We donot need a compass if we can point the star in the sky. In depth, the direction of Dhruv is the direction towards divinity.
Here the belief and faith that Dhruv gained at such young age is commendable. He grasped, worked and achieved his own belief.

Promises are words that are meant to be kept

Nowadays for every now and then we promise in relationship, we promise but how long we keep it. Can we follow it for life. These are the questions we must ask while we promise something to someone. Because promises are meant to be kept. A broken promise can hurt the other person because it is also associated with trust and trust is associated with truth.

Here I read a story about a king and a pigeon. King Shibi was a dutiful King and he exceled as a king in all his fields. So God Indra and Agni decided to test him. They arrived as eagle and pigeon. The pigeon asked Shibi to save it from the eagle. When the eagle arrived, Shibi had to give a portion of his flesh of his right thigh which is equal to the weight of pigeon and the story didn’t end there. As king Shibi gave a portion of his flesh, the scale remained unbalanced as the pigeon weight was more than the flesh. Lastly, the king had to sit on the balanced pan to meet the weight of the pigeon. Shibi promised the pigeon that he will save it and he saved it.

The story touched my heart. Nowadays when there are very little value of words of acquaintances in our daily life, a king was ready to give his life for a bird. He gained the courage while following a life of truthfness and honesty.

Respect the time

From Gita to many scriptures, all mentions that time is powerful and time changes. From nature to human, no one can escape time.
Here we will not discuss the story of the book but let’s discuss on Gupta empire as it  can be an extraordinary example to understand the same. Gupta empire was known as the “golden age in Indian history” due to its excellent art and sculpture. But did the Gupta kings who ruled for centuries ever imagined that it will be ruined and destroyed one day. Now in 21st century, the sculptors are showpieces. This is the power of time. Golden period comes in everyone’s life but it perishes. So time is everything and everything is time.

Duties and responsibilities

The book also focus on how to never forget your duty and responsibilities even on tough situation. One of the story in the book narrates about a king who is ready to give his last meal to a dog as the dog was hungry. Draught in his kingdom destroyed all crops and when there was a scarcity of food, he gave up his plate to a dog to meet his hunger. Because, when he acquired the throne, he promised to follow his duties and responsibilities of saving his kingdom and people. He did the same till his last breath.

Surrender to Supreme

The book also throws light on how materialistic things are of no importance and when one of the powerful king realized the same, he renounced his kingdom. He followed the path of divinity.

So, in wholesome, the book is an excellent read and definitely throws light on  lessons of life.