Fern And Bamboo, The Fable Of Hope

We could say that the tale of the fern and the bamboo is the fable of hope. Why ? Because it conveys the true essence of resilience and perseverance, that is, this story that reflects the importance of not admitting defeat when we face an obstacle, a challenge or at a bad time.

Maybe we don’t see the changes and have a hard time dealing with staying at a point where we don’t see progress, but rather stagnation or even a rollback. Obviously, this is a part of life and there are no doubt many factors that come into play when we consider whether or not to stay on this path which we believe leads to our aspirations.

But what if we stop scratching and our goal isn’t actually that far from us? This is where a phenomenon that has been studied extensively in psychology and economics comes into play: loss aversion.

Emotional and cognitive mistrust of risks

We prefer not to lose rather than to win and that is why we are used to withdrawing quickly enough to “heal healthily” and not take risks. So when we consider a possible gain, we prefer to walk away and avoid the loss rather than come to the profit.

This loss can be emotional, economic, or of any type. What is clear is that if we take this phenomenon into account, we will be able to multiply our possibilities of success in a concrete circumstance.

As Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman have demonstrated, our attitude to problems depends on how we present choices. Therefore, if we think of a person, whom we will call Rose, who maintains a monotonous and boring relationship for 15 years, we can perceive that there is a certain attachment which tends towards the immobility of this person or towards his aversion to ending his relationship.

Whether Rose makes the decision to end her relationship or not depends mostly on how she views the time she has devoted to it. This woman has two options that we are going to outline, first in abstract terms and then more specifically in relation to the case we have presented:

• If we look at the situation in terms of earnings, our response will generally be aversion or distrust of risk or the change of alternatives. That is, if Rose considers emotional stability more valuable than the need to know new things, she will continue this relationship.

• If we are looking at the situation in terms of losses, then we would rather take risks and move on. That is, if Rose believes that she needs this turn in her life and that knowing the world is more important to her than having someone to call on 24 hours a day, then his predisposition is more than obvious.

The same thing happens when we face a bad day or a bad time. If we believe that everything is going wrong, we will probably stick with the idea that whatever we do will only make the situation worse. This will lead us to a high degree of immobility and, as we know, IMMOBILISM IS INCOMPATIBLE WITH LIFE.

Emphasizing this is worthwhile when we have to ask ourselves what we are clinging to and what we need to put into play to achieve our goals. So we need to use these details to make decisions. This is why it is so important to list the pros and cons of the different options that we consider plausible when it comes to deciding something.

The fable of the fern and the bamboo

One day, I decided to admit defeat: I quit my job, I left my partner and my life. I went to the forest to speak with an old man who was said to be a wise man.