In a forest, there was an elephant which was extremely strong and possessed a powerful pair of tusks. One day, a thin and lean man came and trapped the elephant in a cage. The man used to stab the elephant periodically with a spiked stick. Soon the elephant became conditioned to the reality that there were only two kinds of experiences in life : pain when the man poked it with the stick, and pleasure in the absence of poking. Thus the man was able to tame the elephant and became the rider of the elephant.
After some time, the elephant forgot that there was an alternate reality, in which it had roamed free in the forest, without any fear, and remaining all powerful. One day, when the rider was away, the elephant struggled to free itself. It struggled hard, and after days of intense effort, was able to shatter the cage. The elephant ran towards its freedom. The rider, to thwart the elephant's escape attempt, climbed a tree and jumped down, planning to land on the elephant’s back and hence subdue him once again. The rider missed and landed right in front of the elephant. The elephant saw the rider in front of him, but instead of killing him, made his escape into the forest.
The rider got up again. He was weak but not dead. He recovered and began a search for the elephant once again. Sure enough, it spotted the elephant standing near a lake one day. He sought the help from other elephant tamers, and dug a huge pit. He covered it with grass and shrubs, camouflaging the hole underneath. The elephant stepped on the grass covering the pit, and fell down in the pit. The rider again poked the elephant with a stick till it subjugated to his will.
The elephant still stands in that pit today, conditioned by the reality that the stick determines its pain and pleasure.
Know this, the elephant is yourself on this earth. You possess two powerful tusks in the form of viveka (discrimination or discernment) and vairagya (dispassion towards both pain and pleasure). The rider is the ignorant mind. Though you are extremely powerful like the elephant, once ignorance in the form of a rider takes control, the mind will condition you to forget everything and only perceive life in terms of pleasure and pain. The cage of the elephant is the cage of desires that you build around yourself. An iron cage rusts with time, but the cage of desires only gets stronger with time. Like the elephant broke out of the cage, there are times in your life when you will get a glimpse of the truth and make an effort to seek a higher truth. Just as the rider lay helpless before the elephant when it did break free, the mind is at your disposal at those times when you are inspired to make efforts and break free from the shackles of a mundane life to inquire into higher truths. At that time ignorance is weakened, and it is the ideal time to kill it. Although, ignorance is wounded, it is extremely resilient. The other elephant tamers are the past memories of the times that you have experienced bodily pleasures and pains. Ignorance clouds your mind with these residual memories and you again get tempted to indulge in in vain worldly matters.
Know this, every-one is born powerful and possesses the two qualities of discrimination and dispassion, but if ignorance renders both these qualities useless, then you remain imprisoned in the forest that you call your world.
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