I’ve read this book a number of times. “The Prophet” by Kahlil Gibran. And each time I discover something I’d never quite noticed before. Admittedly too, the first time I read it, the content flew over my head…like miles over. When you look at the names of the chapters though, they’re pretty basic…”On time”, “On pain”, “On eating and drinking.” Can’t be difficult to process, surely? And in all reality, it isn’t. But what is required is the readiness to absorb it all.

Because mountains of absorption is required. Basics. It reminds us of the importance of the basics of the way of life. Let me rephrase. It takes situations we all face and concepts we overcomplicate and reminds us of how simple it really is. Don’t believe me? How’s this for trying to understand the difference between Good and Evil:

“Of the good in you I can speak, but not of the evil.
For what is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and thirst?
Verily when good is hungry it seeks food even in dark caves, and when it thirsts it drinks even of dead waters.
You are good when you are one with yourself.
Yet when you are not one with yourself you are not evil.
For a divided house is not a den of thieves; it is only a divided house.”

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We get so caught up in extremes. If there is right, there must be wrong. If there is light, there must be dark. But what if there is no wrongs, only rights? No dark, only light or the absence thereof? Sometimes in our aim to simplify, we complicate. In our wanting to make everything easier, we lose the realness, the truth of what is. It’s way simpler to have a yes and no, as opposed to two yes’es.

And this is what the book does…it makes us question all that we believe. If we ready for it.