The chained elephant

The following is a story that I think can't be told enough. I just recently learned about it, and it has already positively affected my life. It's a story by Jorge Bucay, about an elephant.

When I was a small boy, I was completely fascinated by the circus, and I liked the animals the most. Especially the elephant was my favorite. As I later learned, it's the favorite animal of most children. During one of the circus performances, the huge animal showcased its enormous weight, its impressive size, and strength. After the performance though, and in the time until just before the performance, the elephant stood chained to a small stake in the ground. The stake was nothing more than a piece of wood, just a few centimeters in the ground. And although the chain was quite powerful and heavy, for me, there was no doubt that an animal with the power to pull out a whole tree with its roots would have enough strength to free itself from the stake. This riddle puzzled me until today. What's keeping him back? Why doesn't he get up and leave? As a six or seven-year-old, I still trusted the wisdom of adults. So, I asked a teacher, a father, or an uncle about the riddle with the elephant. One of them told me that the elephant wouldn't leave because it was trained. My next question was obvious: "And if he's trained, why does he need to be chained?" I can't remember ever having gotten a conclusive answer. After a while, I forgot about the riddle with the chained elephant and only remembered it when I met other people who asked themselves the same question. A few years ago, fortunately, I found that someone was wise enough to answer the question: The elephant doesn't leave because it has been chained since it was a baby.

I closed my eyes and imagined the helpless newborn elephant tethered to the stake. I was sure that at that moment, it was pushing, pulling, and sweating, trying to free itself. And despite all its efforts, it could not succeed because the stake was firmly planted in the ground. I imagined that it fell into a deep sleep, exhausted, and then tried again the next day, and the day after that, and the day after... until one day, a fateful day for its future, the animal accepted its powerlessness and resigned itself to its fate.

This huge, powerful elephant that we see in the circus does not flee because, poor thing, it believes it cannot.

The memory of how powerless it felt shortly after its birth has burned too deeply into its memory. And the worst part is that it has never seriously questioned this memory. It has never again tried to test its strength.