The Firewood Burns Out, the Flame Passes On

answered by Zhuangzi, The Secret of Caring for Life

기원전 4세기경

🎬 TODAY'S FILM — IT ASKS THIS

Mr. Holland's Opus (1995)

dir. Stephen Herek · USA

A person dreamed of a great work of his own but, pressed by livelihood, deferred it all his life. Is the unrealized dream wasted years, or a flame that caught in others and burns on?

THE QUESTION THE FILM ASKS

If I never achieved the dream I deferred my whole life, does the time I lived remain a failure?

THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER · ORIGINAL

指窮於爲薪火傳也不知其盡也

📜 THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER

The firewood is consumed, but the flame is passed on, and no one knows when it will end.

💡 TL;DR

Zhuangzi said the firewood burns out, but the flame passes to the next log and is never extinguished.

📝The Classic Answers

Zhuangzi said the firewood burns out, but the flame passes to the next log and is never extinguished. Even if the dream I meant to realize is not completed in my own hands, if that flame has caught in someone else, the life is not spent. If a deferred dream still burns in those who passed through me, I have not failed — I have handed on the fire. Rather than the size of the result, I weigh whom I left an ember with.

— ONGO · Curator

🌱Apply It Today

Today, hand the ember of something you love to even one person. Fulfillment need not end in your own hands.

📖 Classic Source: Zhuangzi, The Secret of Caring for Life. Ancient text in the public domain; rendered and interpreted independently by ONGO.
The film is honored as an equal questioner; its plot is rendered only as a universal dilemma. The classic source is an ancient text (Public Domain), and the reflection is 100% original ONGO content.