This parable has come up multiple times this past week and I felt the need to share it with my readers since I think it can really resonate whether you are currently going through adversity or have let some unfortunate circumstance from the past continue to dictate the way you live everyday life.

The parable of the potato, egg, and coffee beans:

A daughter complained to her father that her life was miserable and that she didn’t know how she was going to make it. She was tired of fighting and struggling all the time. It seemed that just as one problem was solved, another one soon followed.

Her father, a chef, took her to the kitchen. He filled three pots with water and placed each over a higher fire. When the water began to boil, he placed potatoes in one pot, eggs in the second pot, and ground coffee beans in the third pot. He then let them boiling for a while without saying a word to his daughter.

The daughter moaned and waited impatiently, wondering what her father was doing. After twenty minutes he turned off the burners. He took the potatoes and eggs out of the pots, and placed them in different bowls, and poured the coffee into a cup. Turning to her he asked “What do you see?” “Potatoes, eggs and coffee,” she quickly replied. “Look closer,” he said, “and touch the potatoes.” She did and noted that they were soft. He then asked her to take an egg and break it. After removing the shell she observed the hard-boiled egg. Finally he asked her to sip the coffee. Its rich aroma brought a smile to her face. “Father, what does this mean?” she asked. He then explained that the potatoes, eggs and coffee beans had each faced the same adversity- boiling water. However, each one reacted differently.

The moral of the story…

The potato went in strong, hard and unrelenting, but in boiling water it become soft and weak.
The egg was fragile, with the thin outer shell protecting its liquid interior until it was put in the boiling water. Then the inside of the egg became hard.

However, the ground coffee beans were unique. After being exposed in the boiling water, they changed the water and created something new.

“Which are you?” he asked his daughter. When adversity knocks to your door, how do you respond? Are you a potato, an egg or a coffee bean?”

Whether it be a heartbreak, death of a loved one, failure, or trauma (boiling water) you can be the potato who went in hard and seemingly resilient but then turned into mush. The egg whose outer shell was fragile allowed the circumstance mold it into something that became hardened. Yet, the coffee bean adapted and came out on the other side using the adversity to become something greater. My mindset is we may not be able to control what happens to us but we always have a choice on how we respond and react. With this said, be the coffee bean! The choice is yours.