“The Life Style and the Philosophical Thinking from the CRABS ”『螃蟹的生命哲思』

By: Tong-Fei Yu; Translated By: Evnlyn Lee（林一華）

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          Along the coastal areas where the folks like to catch crabs, there was a valuable lesson to be learned from this unique wisdom passed from generation to generation.

          The coastal people, when they caught the crabs, they put them in special bamboo basket which shaped like a wine bottle with a narrow opening wide enough for only one arm to reach down the basket. Though the neck of the basket is narrow, the base of the basket is wide, big enough to hold many crabs. It took special skill to handle the crabs. If  there was only one crab in the basket, the folks would tightly cover the opening of the basket in preventing the crab from escaping.

          But, if there were two or more crabs in the basket, they need not have to cover the opening, because the crabs could not escape from the basket.

          What is the reason for this unusual behavior ?

           It happened this way, when there was only one crab in the basket, the crab in attempt to escape, would climb up along the inner wall of the thick bamboo basket towards the opening, the folks had to cover the opening to prevent the lonely crab from escaping. But when there were two or more crabs in the basket, the crabs would crawl along the inner wall of the bamboo basket towards the opening. They all wanted to escape. When one crab was close to the opening, the next crab would attempt to escape too. At that moment the next crab would try it’s very best to pull down the first crab at the opening so it could escape too.

         In this manner, when one crab would escape at the opening, the other crab behind him would pull the crab in front of him. The repetitious crawling and pulling among the crabs, no crabs would ever be able to escape. The folks would never have to worry the multitude crabs from escaping,  that explained why they needn’t have to cover the opening of the basket.

         When we face life’s stumbling blocks and fear of failure, sometimes we act like the crabs in the basket. If our anxiety and distress came from the vicious scandals from other people, we crawl and pull like the crabs in the negative way. By nature. we would not allow another person to excel over our ability. Nevertheless, we should never allow ourselves to waste unnecessary energy over groundless malicious scandals.

         No one would kick a dead dog on the street, nor would a naughty boy throw rocks at a fruitless tree. If some one would encounter you and let you down to make you feel deadly fear of failure, this is not because you are not good enough. On the contrary, you are continuously growing and developing mentally, your endeavor to excel triggers the jealousy of other people causing them to let you down to their level. 

         We hope we remember the crabs in the basket in the positive way. Every day we diligently work hard on self-improvement and self-encouragement till we reach the land of excellence.