One evening, I had the privilege to meet and dine with Yasser Akkaoui the managing director and editor in chief of the Executive Business Magazine.
During our dinner, I asked him:
Yasser, so with all the companies you run, responsibilities and family, how do you manage your time?
Yasser replied:
Let me answer you with a story I heard once. This is how I manage my business.
What follows is the story as shared by Yasser:
Once upon a time, in a small village in the desert, a wise Bedouin was living there and was known to have fathered 50 children.
His words of wisdom made him famous throughout the other villages and even his wisdom and reputation spread to tourists that were visiting other villages.
One Western reporter was intrigued by the stories he heard about him, so he decide to visit his village and ask him a difficult question and experience his wisdom firsthand. It was not easy for the reporter to come up with such a question, but after days of reflection, he thought he figured a hard question he could ask the Bedouin.
Upon arriving, the reporter was greeted with tea and dates, as it was customary. They sat down and started talking about general things. The reporter asked:
Is it true that you have fathered 50 children?
And the Bedouin replied:
Yes, that is true.
Then the reporter, unable to contain his burning question, said to him:
Who of your children do you love the most?
The Bedouin took a short while to think and then answered:
I love the young until they grow older
I love the sick until they get better
…and I love the travelers until they come back home
In my opinion, the moral of the story is that love is not possessive. Love is an act of kindness, care and compassion. There is no limit to our love and how many or how much we can love. Love is an expression. It does not manifest in this or that way but in whatever way it feels natural to you.
You may also like: