Bedtime stories for Kids - Easy way to Wealth

Easy Way to Wealth


Prasad was a young man of twenty-three. He had a fine body, strong and beautiful. But just as an insect inside a golden mango eats it away slowly, and makes it uneatable, so Prasad's laziness corroded his body and mind and made him useless. All-day long he went from one friend's house to another, ate at someone's house, and slept late at night. Thus he spent an aimless life. Soon his parents died one after another following an epidemic of a strange new disease in the village. Prasad became an orphan all of a sudden and he did not know what to do to keep himself going. He did not have any skill or art by which he could earn even a modest living. Driven by circumstances, he went to the yogi who lived on the banks of the river that flowed through his village. The yogi was in deep meditation when Prasad approached him. He waited a while. When he opened his eyes, the yogi saw Prasad standing in front of him and he asked him: "Son, what is it that you want from me?" Prasad bowed to the Yogi and narrated to him his life's story. "I cannot give you money, but, I can give you a secret knowledge by which you will be able to see whatever is hidden under the ground. And this capacity will give you enough money for your living," said the Yogi after hearing Prasad's sad story. "A blind man asks for sight and a poor man asks for money. What can I want from you Yogi my king!" said Prasad in all humility.


"At the same time," warned the Yogi, "You should be very careful not to use the wealth that you find under the earth for yourself. Your secret knowledge should be used only for other's benefit. You will lose power if you use it for yourself." Prasad looked at the Yogi with a question in his mind. "Don't worry. When you help others, the others will help you," said the Yogi. Prasad thanked the Yogi and walked towards the neighboring village. Soon, he came to a forest. As he was crossing it, he saw a group of travelers coming towards him. Suddenly, he saw something inside the ground and shouted alerting the travelers. "Halt! there is a danger in front of you!" The travelers were surprised by this sudden warning and halted. They thought that there was a wild animal nearby and they panicked. But, Prasad explained: "There is no wild animal nearby. The real danger is that there is a quicksand mire right in front of you. If you had taken three more steps you would have fallen into it." The leader of the traveler's group did not quite believe Prasad. He asked skeptically, "You are bluffing us. Where is the quicksand? I see the only hard ground and even some shrubs around me. Come on colleagues, let us go." Saying so, he had hardly taken three steps forward when he fell into the quicksand mine and immediately sank up to his waist. "Help! Help! I'm sinking!" shouted the leader. The others threw a long stick at him and with its help, they managed to save their leader. 


The travelers felt very grateful to Prasad for his timely help and gave him some money before proceeding on their journey. Prasad felt happy to have got the test of his new powers and for his being able to help others. When he reached the neighboring village, he felt very thirsty and he went to a lonely hut to request for some water. As he neared the hut, he heard the wailing of a lady. "It is now more than two days and you have hardly brought home any money. There is no food today- not even for the little one! O God, how long shall we live in such poverty..." Prasad felt very sad and went inside the hut in order to give the lady some consolation. As he went near the kitchen he saw something remarkable under the ground. He stood dumb for a second and then he exclaimed: "What wealth! What gold! Who said you are poor? Dig here and you will get a pot full of gold coins!" The poor man and the wife thought that Prasad was telling all those things only to make them happy for a while. When Prasad told them all about his strange powers they believed him.


They started digging in the kitchen floor and hardly had they dug for two feet when they hit upon a pot full of gold coins. The lady almost went mad with joy. The man danced like one possessed. After a while, they quietened down and thanked Prasad, saying, "You have been sent by God Himself. Without your coming, we would have taken to begging." They then gave a few gold coins to Prasad and he bade them a hearty goodbye. As Prasad strolled around in the village, he hit upon another treasure trove in one of the fields. On inquiry, he found out that the field belonged to two brothers, Rajan and Ranga. The brothers were quite poor as such, but, they were known to be the best of brothers in the whole village. They loved each other very much, they shared all their wealth and they lived in perfect harmony. So, Prasad thought of helping them with his discovery and told about it to Ranga, as the elder brother Rajan was not at home. The idea of having a whole treasure to himself was too tempting to be shared with his brother. So, Ranga went alone at night and started digging at the spot that was previously shown by Prasad. Rajan had noticed a strangeness in his brother's behavior that day. So, he had kept a close watch on his brother and at night he had followed Ranga to the field. When the jar of jewelry was unearthed by Ranga, Rajan came out of his hiding and demanded his share. Soon, the brothers were fighting over the treasure and the fight ended in both the brothers becoming unconscious and a passer-by stealing the jewelry! The next day when Prasad came to know of the incident, he cursed himself, for he felt responsible for it. 


He decided thereafter he would not help others and he would not earn his living by this easy method. Easy money is a curse on everyone he thought. So, the next time when he came upon some wealth he took it for himself and thereby willingly lost all his extraordinary powers. With that wealth, he established a business, and by sheer hard work he earned a good living and within a few years, he became rich. He realized that there is no alternative to hard work, which brings not only money but also peace and satisfaction in one's life.
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