From the very first day of birth, Monas affectionately call their sons Kumbalain.
In one family, the parents also called their first-born Kumbalain and got so used to it that they forgot to give him a name. Kumbalain grew up strong and hardworking. One day a palmist came from a neighboring village. He looked at Kumbalain's hand and said:
– The lines of your palm indicate that a happy future awaits you. You will always be cheerful and carefree, you will live in abundance and prosperity.
Kumbalain was happy and stopped working. He turned into a lazy man and a slacker, spending all his days in idle chatter with his friends. Soon Kumbalain married a girl named Kunva - this is how the monks affectionately call their daughters-in-law. And he moved into the house.
However, marriage did not change his lifestyle at all. As before, he wandered around the village all day, from early morning until late at night, and avoided work, whether in the field or at home, in every possible way. Meanwhile, time passed, and his first child appeared. The mother-in-law tried in vain to reason with her son-in-law, nothing helped - the son-in-law was still idle: he ate, drank, walked, and in response to his mother-in-law's reproaches he replied that he had a special destiny - to enjoy life.
The father-in-law and mother-in-law strongly disliked his son-in-law and stopped talking to him, but Kumbalain did not pay attention to this. Meanwhile, his daughter was born. The father-in-law and mother-in-law lost patience and drove the idle son-in-law out of the house.
Kumbalain had to settle with his wife and two children in an abandoned hut on the edge of the village. From now on, the family existed on the pittance that the wife earned from selling vegetables and mushrooms, and Kumbalain sat all day long, waiting for the benefits promised by the palmist.
One day, the wife returned from the market, began to cook food, and ordered Kumbalain to look after the children. Kumbalain silently looked at the unruly children and did not even try to calm them down. One of the kids hurt his leg painfully and burst into tears. The wife got angry, slapped Kumbalain and kicked him out of the house.
Kumbalain could no longer bear this. He decided to find the palmist at all costs and take out all his anger on him.
And the palmist, it seemed, was just waiting for him.
“Now I’ll explain everything to you,” he said. - Just first, please, climb the breadfruit tree and pick me a few fruits!
Kumbalain deftly climbed to the very top, then the palmist and his students began to shake the tree as hard as they could, and in order not to fall, Kumbalain clung to the trunk with all his might.
- What are you doing? – Kumbalain was furious. Having had plenty of fun, the palmist said:
- You can come down, my dear. I hope that now you understand what my predictions mean. No matter how good the lines of the hand are, you won’t be able to catch a fish out of the pond without difficulty. If you hadn’t made an effort, if you hadn’t grabbed onto the tree with all your strength, you would certainly have fallen down. Only those who work hard and diligently reap the fruits of their labor! There has never been a person in the world for whom blessings fell from heaven. The lines of the hand have nothing to do with it.
Then Kumbalain understood the true meaning of the palmist's predictions. He began to work hard, as before, and three years later he became rich, won the love of his wife and the respect of his mother-in-law. And only from then on did Kumbalain begin to experience true pleasure from life.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru