A long time ago, a girl named Li\u2011Li got married and went to live with her husband and mother\u2011in\u2011law. In a very short time, Li\u2011Li found that she couldn’t get along with her mother\u2011in\u2011law at all. Their personalities were very different, and Li\u2011Li was angered by many of her mother\u2011in\u2011law’s habits. In addition, she criticized Li\u2011Li constantly.<\/p>\n
Days passed days, and weeks passed weeks. Li\u2011Li and her mother\u2011in\u2011law never stopped arguing and fighting. But what made the situation even worse was that, according to ancient Chinese tradition, Li\u2011Li had to bow to her mother\u2011in\u2011law and obey her every wish. All the anger and unhappiness in the house was causing the poor husband great distress. Finally, Li\u2011Li could not stand her mother\u2011in\u2011law’s bad temper and dictatorship any longer, and she decided to do something about it. Li\u2011Li went to see her father’s good friend, Mr. Huang, who sold herbs.<\/p>\n
She told him the situation and asked if he would give her some poison so that she could solve the problem once and for all. Mr. Huang thought for a while, and finally said, “Li\u2011Li, I will help you solve your problem, but you must listen to me and obey what I tell you.” Li\u2011Li said, “Yes, Mr. Huang, I will do whatever you tell me to do.” Mr. Huang went into the back room, and returned in a few minutes with a package of herbs. He told Li\u2011Li, “You can’t use a quick\u2011acting poison to get rid of your mother\u2011in\u2011law, because that would cause people to become suspicious. Therefore, I have given you a number of herbs that will slowly build up poison in her body. Every other day prepare some pork or chicken and put a little of these herbs in her serving. Now, in order to make sure that nobody suspects you when she dies, you must be very careful to act very friendly towards her. Don’t argue with her, obey her every wish, and treat her like a queen.”<\/p>\n
Li\u2011Li was so happy. She thanked Mr. Huang and hurried home to start her plot of murdering her mother\u2011in\u2011law. Weeks went by, and months went by, and every other day, Li\u2011Li served the specially treated food to her mother\u2011in\u2011law. She remembered what Mr. Huang had said about avoiding suspicion, so she controlled her temper, obeyed her mother\u2011in\u2011law, and treated her like her own mother.<\/p>\n
After six months had passed, the whole household had changed. Li\u2011Li had practiced controlling her temper so much that she found that she almost never got mad or upset. She hadn’t had an argument in six months with her mother\u2011in\u2011law, who now seemed much kinder and easier to get along with. The mother\u2011in\u2011law’s attitude toward Li\u2011Li changed, and she began to love Li\u2011Li like her own daughter. She kept telling friends and relatives that Li\u2011Li was the best daughter\u2011in\u2011law one could ever find. Li\u2011Li and her mother\u2011in\u2011law were now treating each other like a real mother and daughter. Li\u2011Li’s husband was very happy to see what was happening.<\/p>\n
One day, Li\u2011Li came to see Mr. Huang and asked for his help again. She said, “Dear Mr. Huang, please help me to keep the poison from killing my mother\u2011in\u2011law! She’s changed into such a nice woman, and I love her like my own mother. I do not want her to die because of the poison I gave her.”<\/p>\n
Mr. Huang smiled and nodded his head. “Li\u2011Li, there’s nothing to worry about. I never gave you any poison. All of the herbs I gave you were simply to improve her health. The only poison was in your mind and your attitude toward her, but that has been all washed away by the love which you gave to her.” The way we treat others is how they will usually treat us.<\/p>\n
___________________________<\/p>\n
Dietrich Fischer, born in 1941 in M\u00fcnsingen, Switzerland, got a Licentiate in Mathematics from the University of Bern 1968 and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from New York University 1976. 1986-88 he was a MacArthur Fellow in International Peace and Security at Princeton University. He has taught mathematics, computer science, economics and peace studies at various universities and been a consultant to the United Nations.<\/em><\/p>\n Excerpted from Dietrich Fischer’s <\/em>Stories to Inspire You<\/a> – TRANSCEND University Press-TUP<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A long time ago, a girl named Li Li got married and went to live with her husband and mother in law. In a very short time, Li Li found that she couldn’t get along with her mother in law at all. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-inspirational"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55866\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}