The following story that I created reveals advice credited to author Jay Yang.

This story is also a tribute to Miki Hyatt, a counselor, colleague and friend of mine who passed away years ago from brain cancer.

Miki taught me to never give advice for the simple reason that it would be me to be blamed if the advice failed to be successful. She said that I must find a way to lead the person I want to help to follow his own advice so he gives it to himself.

One day, a young man named Henry visited his friend, Arnold. “Hey Arnold, can you help me? I’m looking for advice.”

“Advice about what?” Arnold asked.

“Advice about everything,” Henry replied. “My life is full of chaos. I feel like I’m melting like butter. I need to talk to somebody. You’ve had some issues before, too. Did you see a counselor?”

“I did not,” he said. “But what I did do was go and see the old man on the mountain.”

And so, Henry got the directions and went to see the old man who was living off the grid upon a backwoods mountaintop.

“I’m afraid to do anything,” he said to the old man. “I’m afraid of failing.”

“Fear is a very powerful thing,” said the old man. “And if you are afraid until you die, then what have you wasted?”

“I guess fear won’t stop me from dying, will it?” Henry said, “but it can stop me from living.” He paused for a moment. “Sometimes I buy stuff to try to make me happy, but I don’t spend too much.”

“Well, my son, does buying stuff make you happy?” asked the old man.

“I bought a new dishwasher and it broke after a month. I didn’t pay that much for it, but I got all stressed out when it broke,” explained Henry. “I guess if it costs me my peace of mind, then it was too expensive.

He paused again to think. “And then some friends and family judge my lifestyle and tell me to stop being this or stop being that. They’re telling me what I should not do to help me feel better.”

“And these people — are they happy?” the old man asked.

“No, I don’t think so. They have their share of problems, too. Maybe I shouldn’t take criticism from people I wouldn’t take advice from. I don’t know, I feel trapped.”

“When a ship is docked safely in the harbor, what is it doing?” asked the old man.

“Nothing,” replied Henry. “That’s not the purpose of a ship. That’s not what it’s built for.”

The old man smiled and Henry understood. “A lot of people I know just exist,” Henry said. “They don’t really live their lives. I guess for me to get anything out of my life, I must be willing to do what they won’t do. Just this past month I’ve tried computer dating. I joined a chess club, and I took a cooking class and I didn’t do well on any of them. I’m trying to be perfect, but I’m not.”

The old man put 10 cards, face up, on a table and quickly turned them back over. “Tell me, what were the 10 cards?”

“I don’t know,” answered Henry. “I think there was a king of hearts and maybe an ace of diamonds, but you turned them over too fast for me to remember them all.”

The old man turned one card back to its face and left it there. “What’s this?” he asked.

“That’s a five of hearts,” said Henry. “Are you saying if I try to do too much at the same time, I won’t do anything well so I need to focus on just one thing?”

The old man smiled again. Henry looked down and said, “Maybe I need to get some magic, a miracle to help me move on.”

The old man took Henry outside to a garden. He plucked a purple iris from its stem. “Look inside,” the old man said. “What do you see?”

“It’s beautiful” Henry replied. “I never paid much attention to Nature. Look at the rest of your flowers here. How does Nature create such beauty in a world that I see as only ugly?”

Once again, the old man smiled. They enjoyed a cup of tea together before Henry stood up to leave. “Thank you for opening my eyes to everything that I had been too blind to see before.”

He returned home and later he went to see his friend, Arnold.

“So how was your visit with the old man? What did he tell you to do with your life?” Arnold asked.

“He told me nothing,” said Henry.

Arnold smiled. They shared a loud laugh. “But there was one powerful moment when we stood at his flower garden.”

“Was it about the flowers?” Arnold asked.

“I thought so at first, but now I realize it wasn’t just about them. What I saw was a sense of this incredible serenity when I looked into his magical eyes that came right into my soul. I felt a peace of mind I have never felt before. Now, I know what I’m going to do every morning. It’s one simple thing that will keep me moving forward to live my life like I’ve never done before.”

“What is the one simple thing that you’re going to do?” Arnold asked.

“I’m going to look in the mirror,” said Henry, “and I’m going to see the old man’s serenity in the eyes of the person who’s looking right back at me.”

Email Rich Strack at richiesadie11@gmail.com