Einstein's wife and friends used to tell him, "Albert, you must get some new clothes. All your clothes are old and worn out!"
He would always reply, "No, no, I cannot!"
"Why not?" they asked.
"New clothes never fit me. They itch or they look funny on me or they cause me some other problem. New clothes are a total waste of time!"
Quite often, I am also like that. When I get new clothes, most of the time they do not fit me at all. I say that the reason is because I have developed more muscles. Others may say it is either muscles or fat that is getting in the way! Whichever is true, the result is all the same!
This year Sarah made a kurta for me on her birthday. It was extremely beautiful, so I decided to try it on. First of all, I had incredible difficulty putting on the kurta. It got stuck! Then I had an even worse time trying to take it off. What an experience! In this sense, all my old kurtas are very good.
Einstein simply would not wear new clothes. Usually he would not go to buy clothes even once a year. If others gave him new clothes, he would still not use them.
One day, Einstein's wife begged him, "Please, I would be so grateful if you would buy some new clothes. I love you much more when you wear new clothes. Please do it for me."
"Really, you love me more with new clothes?" he asked. "All right, I am ready. Let us go."
Einstein's wife took her husband to a store, and they bought all new garments for him. At his wife's request, Albert put on the new clothes and wore them into the car. As they returned home, his wife was extremely happy. She said, "Albert, you look so handsome! Today you have made me very, very happy."
Einstein was getting tremendous joy by making his wife happy. Alas, the moment he arrived home, he threw off all his new clothes and put on all old ones."
His wife exclaimed, "Albert, what are you doing? Why have you put on all your ancient, tattered clothes?"
Einstein answered, "These clothes give me inspiration. Unfortunately, I do not get any inspiration from the new ones. Since I must now do something very significant with my work, I need my old clothes to give me inspiration."
Exactly like that, I have known many people who always prefer oldness to newness. For them, anything that is old comes directly from Heaven. They cannot appreciate anything that is new in the slightest.
Life is like that. We are more accustomed to our old life than to our new life, so we treasure everything old.From:Sri Chinmoy,The Master and the circus clown, Agni Press, 2005
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