As a man was passing some elephants, he suddenly stopped, wondered the fact that these huge animals were being held by only a small rope tied to their front legs. No chains, no cages. It was sure that the elephants could, at anytime, break away from their ropes but for some reason, they didn't.
He saw a trainer nearby and asked why these animals just stood there and made no thought to get away. "Well," the trainer said, "when they are very young and much smaller, we use the same size rope to tie them and, at that age, it's enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to run free."
The man was amazed. These animals could at any time escape from their ropes but because they believed they couldn't, they were stuck right where they were.
Like the elephants, how many of us go through life hanging into a belief that we can't do something, simply because we failed at it once before? Failure is part of learning and we should never give up the pains in life.
