An Inspirational Story; “The Salt Of The Earth”

This is a true story about a self-employed carpenter who was struggling with his life. He had a lot of the common problems that carpenters have. He had been in trouble for drinking and using drugs and he had been forced to go to a treatment center many years earlier for his problems. He had been able get help for those problems but he still struggled a lot to make ends meet especially in his financial life. He also was having a lot of trouble finding the right girlfriend who he could stay with. Nobody seemed good enough for him so he jumped from girlfriend to girlfriend, never really finding true love. In fact, true love he thought, was really just a “lie” and the world was generally a selfish place that he hoped he could find his way through by some vague miracle.

One day, the carpenter met an odd little man named “Walking Bob”. Walking Bob was a very interesting person because he had fought in the Korean War as a colonel and had come back to the United States as a celebrated soldier. The carpenter really admired Walking Bob because he heard that he had been a Golden Gloves Boxer for many years. He was a grey haired little man with a lot of great stories to tell.

Probably the most interesting story that Walking Bob had to tell was an extreme tragedy that had befallen him many years after the war. He had returned to America and gotten married to his college sweetheart. He had also raised two children who had eventually grown and gone off to college. One day, when Walking Bob’s wife had gone to the airport to pick up the two kids, they were involved in a terrible car accident. Walking Bob’s wife and two children were killed and Walking Bob was left alone. Because of this terrible tragedy, Walking Bob became very depressed and suffered a heart attack. He was hospitalized and the doctors didn’t know if he would live. He awoke from his hospital bed and told the doctors and nurses that he would be leaving the hospital and would be going on a cross country walk.

The doctors and nurses tried very hard to change Walking Bob’s mind. They told him he was “mentally unstable” but Walking Bob insisted on his plan of leaving the hospital. He began walking for days and days and he told his story to the people he met along the way. He also read from a book called A Course in Miracles as he walked. He practiced the lessons that were written in the book and he spoke to the people he met as he walked.

One day, while walking along his way, he visited a charity organization. Inside, there were some children who were suffering from terminal illnesses and Walking Bob began to cry. People had been giving him money as he had told them his story but now, as he heard the stories of these children, he knew that the money he had been collecting should go to these children instead of him. He gave away everything he had and continued walking. He began collecting more and more money as he walked and he told his story as well as the story of these children. As he collected money, he continued to donate it all to the charity organization known as the “Make a Wish Foundation”.

The self-employed carpenter who was struggling with his life was lucky enough to meet Walking Bob. He heard the story that Walking Bob was telling and he asked him if he could meet with him again and talk some more. Walking Bob decided to take a rest and to stay in the town where the carpenter worked so that the two of them could talk each day. Walking Bob told him about “A Course in Miracles” and told him he should read the book and practice the lessons. The carpenter thought the book was a bit strange but he agreed to read it just to please Walking Bob. Each day Walking Bob talked to the carpenter about his war stories and his Golden Gloves Boxing days and also about A Course in Miracles.

Eventually, the carpenter started practicing the lessons in the Course more seriously and he noticed that his life was actually getting better. He met a girl who he really loved and she asked him to move away with him to a foreign country. The girl’s family was very poor and she had hoped that the carpenter might help her and her family to work their way out of the problems they were in. The carpenter was very scared at first but he remembered a line from the book that Walking Bob had given him. It said “The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite.”

After many months, the carpenter packed up his bags and boarded a plane. He found a job in this far away country and eventually started a business of his own. He practiced the lessons in the book and followed his heart. His life became better and better. His company eventually became very successful and he married the girl he had fallen in love with years before. He helped her family out of the impoverished state they were in and he began helping other people from the impoverished country as well. After struggling for so many years as the salt of the Earth, he had become just like Walking Bob and was no longer struggling but was happier than he had ever been.