Allegory of the Three Travelers

There are three travelers on a great journey across an endless prairie.  In one direction lies a barren and impoverished place.  In another direction lies a place of abundance.


The first traveler is traveling in great luxury. This traveler is thinking, "I have worked hard for all the things I have and I will defend them. I feel sorry for those less fortunate than myself. There, but for the Grace of God, go I."

The second traveler is struggling to get by with next to nothing. This traveler is thinking, "I am working as hard as I can but still do not have enough for my children. It is not fair that the first traveler should have so much and I demand that they share with me."

The third traveler agrees that things are not fair. This traveler is thinking, "The system is rigged against me. I do not intend to spend my life working hard for next to nothing. I will just take what I need from the other travelers."

The conflict among these travelers takes place within the vessel that transports them across the prairie.  This vessel and its journey began as a single cell first dividing 3.5 billion years ago.

About a million years ago the vessel began to produce organisms resembling our travelers.  None of them is fully responsible for the circumstances in which they find themselves yet, in the conflict among them, each believes they own the truth.

The conflict among these travelers is wearing on the vessel that carries them across the prairie.  The travelers cannot see that repairing the vessel would resolve the conflict.

The vessel fuels itself through a single operation.  It uses sunlight to create the molecules that form its organisms.  When these molecules are cycling through plant, animal, fungal and bacterial processes they build up in the vessel.  When the cycling is broken the molecules are lost and the vessel loses capability.

Repair of the vessel requires the contribution of all its passengers.  Only we humans are capable of seeing past our individual needs and tending to the needs of the vessel.  In that step we begin to chart a course to an abundant future.

This is the First of a Four Parts.

The Second Part is Comments on the Allegory - Coming of Age
The Third Part is Comment on the Allegory - Repairing the Vessel
The Fourth Part is Comment on the Allegory - Human Potential

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