Two Keys to Happiness
By Harold Klemp
I saw an advertisement for a little electronic device that makes a sound like a dragonfly. The ad said dragonflies are the mortal enemy of mosquitoes. “Be safe from mosquitoes!” it said.
Since we had a trip to Africa planned for this summer, I thought the device might be a good thing to take along. They have different insects there who haven’t tasted me yet and might consider me a delicacy. So I bought a few—then remembered on the plane that I’d forgotten to pack them.
When I got home from the trip, I was eager to try these things out. Feeling kind of foolish, I hung one of them around my neck. Then I figured if I was going to try these things, I might as well do it right—so I put on two and went outside.
The device was making a peculiar noise, a clicking sound like dragonflies supposedly make. The instructions had said that it’s best to use the device in a quiet area where noise doesn’t drown out the click. So I was out watering the flowers and feeding the birds, and the mosquitoes were just tearing into me.
“This thing isn’t working,” I said. “Maybe we have mosquitoes who are hard of hearing.”
Then I realized the water from the hose was drowning out the sound. So I turned off the hose. And the next thing I knew, a dragonfly flew over to me. The dragonfly kept trying to come closer and closer. This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when I bought the devices.
I went inside and told my wife what had happened. “I can’t use these things,” I said. That week we got two more of them in the mail from an ECK friend. So I sat one in the window by my desk. One day I noticed a dragonfly buzzing around the screen.
The device didn’t repel mosquitoes, but it did a good job attracting dragonflies.
No matter what you do in life, if you can just love what you’re doing and see the gift of God in little things, you’ll be happy. To me, the dragonfly coming over was a big thing. It doesn’t take much to keep me happy.
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Excerpt from What Is Spiritual Freedom? Mahanta Transcripts, Book 11.