Abstain from Gossip

A villager used to indulge in malicious gossip about a saint. One day he visited the saint and told him, ‘Swami, I have spread wild rumours against you for lack of anything else to do. Now I have realized that you are a very good person. Please forgive me for all the sins that I have committed and show me a way to absolve me of all the negative karmic effects I have accumulated through speaking ill of you’.

The saint replied ‘Take a pillow from your house to a junction where several streets meet. Rip the pillow and scatter all the cotton on the streets. And then come back and see me’. The man did as the saint had instructed and went back to the saint to report completion of the assigned task.

The saint said, ‘Now, if you are really interested in freeing yourself of the consequences of your misdeeds, then I suggest you return to that junction, pick up all the cotton you had strewn, stuff it back into the pillow case and bring back the pillow to me’. The man was confused and asked the saint ‘How is it possible to collect the cotton as they would have been swept away by the breeze?’

The saint said, ‘You are right. You cannot reclaim the cotton that got dispersed because the breeze would have scattered it in all directions. Similarly there is no remedy that will absolve you of your sins. The only solution for the problem is to abstain from such gossip henceforth’.

My mind always works on perfecting the comforts of life I want to bestow on you.