Word 023
Every January, the slopes of Wakakusa-yama are set ablaze.
The mountain burning — an ancient Nara ritual — sweeps across the dry hillside without mercy. Flames paint the night sky a deep, burning red.
Yet each spring, the scorched earth bursts into the most vivid green of the year.
The people of Nara have always known: it is the fire itself that makes the grass grow brightest.
There is a phrase my grandmother often said to me when I faced problems and worries.
"Heaven never gives a person a problem they cannot overcome."
In other words: there is no problem that anyone truly cannot overcome.
Trials, problems, and hardships are the whetstone that sharpens us.
So then — why not play with them?
The grass of Wakakusa-yama grows stronger with every burning. Perhaps we do too.