A Fairy Tale

"I once read a silly fairy tale, called The Three Princes of Serendip: as their highnesses travelled, they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things which they were not in quest of: for instance, one of them discovered that a mule blind of the right eye had travelled the same road lately, because the grass was eaten only on the left side, where it was worse than on the right—now do you understand serendipity?"

I found this story and was intrigued for two reasons. One, what was I - what am I in quest of? I feel as if I relate better to the blind mule more often than a high Prince with the priveledge of a third party perspective. It seems as if it's pretty much a given that to be a human is to be a blind mule. Look, we usually travel the same roads to work/school everyday, eat from the same locations, shop at the same grocery stores, walk our dogs on the same street each evening, this list goes on. Is this simply because we trust it, or is it because we are all living serendipidously?

Secondly, what's the deal with these Princes? "...they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things they were not in quest of...". Must be nice that through "accidents and sagacity" you stumble upon a golden ticket of some sort (if this was a Princess, there would be no accidents it would be meticulously planned, but apparently all the Princess are busy waiting to be saved and/or too distressed to make the auditions). Back to my second point, if you reread the story, it implies that these Princes too are living a quest serendipidously unaware, they are only privy to the blind mule's serendipitous nature (I think I might have just found the key to the door of our jealous nature).

However, I don't believe the moral of this "fairytale's" story is about jealousy or third party perspectives, or Prince vs Princesses, although if it was a Princess, I believe she might have a better chance at seeing her own serendipity (wink). But on a serious note, I think the story is telling us not to be so autonomous that we miss the opportunity to travel a path, familiar or foreign, with one eye or both, but just to go as we are. That on occasion, this could (and quite possibly) lead to the accidental discovery of new knowledge. Is this the path to enlightenment?