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him to guide anybody. Of course the desire to guide is there in everybody, it is very ego-fulfilling. That's why everybody is ready to give you advice whether you ask for it or not. Unasked for advice is being given, and good advice, because everybody wants to be, at least in SOMEBODY'S eyes, a wise man. And it is very easy to advise others. They may not have practised the same thing in their own life...
There is a Sufi story. A woman came to a Sufi mystic with her small child who was eating too many sweets, ice cream and all kinds of things, and the mother was worried. The mother believed that sugar was white poison; she believed in naturopathy. But the child was adamant and he wouldn't listen.
She told the mystic 'I have tried every possible way: I have punished him, I have rewarded him -- nothing works! He goes on eating sweets, he simply eats sweets and nothing else. He is ready to be hungry but he won't eat anything else; the whole day he goes on stuffing himself. We are worried -- it is going to be dangerous for his health, for his teeth, and everything will be affected. You have to do something. You have always been of great help to me -- please advise this stupid child. He is very stubborn.'
The mystic looked at the child and said to the woman, 'Come back after three weeks. I cannot advise you right now.' Even the child was curious, because so many people were advising him. He looked at the mystic and said, 'What is the matter? -- because every person that I have come across advises me, and my mother takes me to every place. I have become accustomed to all this nonsense, and I have to listen. You are the first man who has wanted three weeks. Are you going to ponder over it?'
And the old man said, 'No, my child, I am not going to ponder over it. I love sweets myself. I cannot advise you right now. I am not the right person to advise you; my advice will be futile. Three weeks I will practise. If I can manage at this age to drop sweets completely, then I can advise you. If I fail I will confess "I cannot advise him -- take him to somebody else."'
After three weeks they came back and the old man said, 'Three weeks more will
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