The Sage and the tricky question

This old Indian story is perhaps where the Schrödinger's cat experiment of the west, got its inspiration from.

A sage was highly reputed for giving accurate answers to all the questions thrown at him. Every student was in awe to take lessons from him. Naturally, like today’s Harvard or Stanford or IIT, the rejection rate at his institute was very high. One such student who had been rejected on three previous attempts, finally succeeded in getting admitted. Once he got admitted, he was determined to teach the sage a lesson and prove a point.

During a class once, by holding a tiny butterfly in his closed fist, he asked, “Master, I want to know from you whether the butterfly in my fist is dead or alive.” The sage smiled and replied, “Oh dear student, not only the butterfly, but the fate of the butterfly is in your hand. If you want it to be alive it will be, if you want it to be dead, it will be.” The student was surprised by this reply and realized his mistake. The sage was absolutely right, once more.

We are more likely to find answers to tricky questions in our hand. If we realize that we have the absolute power to make or break, on some instances, we can achieve to our full potential.