“Ah Shifu. There is just news. There is no good or bad.” – Master Oogway in the movie Kung Fu Panda

Master Oogway’s simple words hide the profoundness of the wisdom they express. Profound but still puzzling, especially in an age where we can’t get by one day without the media and society bombarding us with news clearly categorized as good or bad.. mostly bad actually! Master Oogway’s words are therefore difficult to digest. But because they are Master Oogway’s, I thought I’d examine them a little more closely.

Hmmm.. so how does this work? At first it seemed like a lot of rationalizing, but guess what.. the meanings I gave to the events that happened to me the other day made all the difference.

Like.. I reached the airport only to discover that my flight was delayed because of likely bad weather on the way. Not bad news, I told myself, it’s good news that the airport can forecast bad weather for my flight so much in advance. I’d rather chill out at the airport than be caught trembling in the middle of some turbulent weather!

Ah, that gave me time to grab a coffee at the airport’s dispensing machine. More good news.. the machine was working and the coffee was hot! Oops.. I tripped over a bag and the coffee spilled on my laptop bag barely missing my shirt! BAD NEWS! I sheepishly cleaned the mess, embarrassed about my clumsiness and to my surprise a young lady approached me with another fresh cup of coffee (she got one for herself too!).

Good news, I thought! Now I had some company as I discovered that her flight was delayed too! We started chatting and half an hour flew by in less than a minute. And just when things were warming up, her fiancée popped up from nowhere with tickets to an earlier flight and that left me alone and bored all over again.

By now I was suitably convinced of Master Oogway’s words and when my flight departure was finally announced all the passengers cheerfully applauded.. all except me. I wasn’t sure by now whether this was really good news and more bad news in disguise.

On the flight, there was disappointment for passengers as the beverage service was cancelled. Not me. Master Oogway’s words were now ringing in my head like a church bell on a Sunday afternoon. In any case who wanted to risk more spilled coffee?

The weather at our destination airport was excellent and as we approached the runway, I was tempted to heave a sigh of relief and give it the ‘good news’ label. I was still pondering over it when the aircraft landed with a thud, a real hard landing that scared the hell out of me. “That was BAD”, I said, only to be corrected by the elderly gentleman sitting next to me. “A hard landing is sometimes necessary to avoid the aircraft skidding on a slippery runway!” Wow, then that was a really GOOD landing, I thought.

As I left the airport in the cab, I thought of the day gone by and realized what a struggle it was to NOT label events as good or bad or news as good or bad. If Master Oogway was real perhaps I would have asked him. “HELP !!! Master Oogway, help me understand this better”. I turned to the next best solution – Google, which in turn helped me discover this interesting discussion.

Oogway: My friend, the panda will never fulfill his destiny, nor you yours until you let go of the illusion of control.
Shifu: Illusion?
Oogway: Yes. [points at peach tree]
Oogway: Look at this tree, Shifu: I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time.
Shifu: But there are things we can control: I can control when the fruit will fall, I can control where to plant the seed: that is no illusion, Master!
Oogway: Ah, yes. But no matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.
Shifu: But a peach cannot defeat Tai Lung!
Oogway: Maybe it can, if you are willing to guide, to nurture it, to believe in it.
Shifu: But how? How? I need your help, master.
Oogway: No, you just need to believe. Promise me, Shifu, promise me you will believe.

And so I decided to believe. I really do believe it, Master Oogway.
There is just news. Neither good nor bad.

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