The monkey and the microscope

An illustration of one monkey sitting down at a microscope and another sitting at a telescope looking at a night sky.

Barbara Pollard

The Monkey was extremely fascinated with the unknown, from the smallest particle of existence to what would perhaps become the grandeur.

Serendipitously, it acquired a microscope to continue to explore its existence, starting with the smallest amoeba and iota. Its knowledge grew from there.

Suddenly the Monkey was studying all natural sciences. It realized that the many aspects of knowledge were intricately and infinitely connected. The world was wild and beautiful.

The more that the Monkey’s brain increased with retention of knowledge, the more the microscope grew, as if the Monkey had planted a seed in the ground.

After a while, the Monkey realized there was more to see beyond the microscope.

It put the microscope down and said “I’m going to use my own eyes for a minute, my own common senses.” The monkey walked through the woods, sat by a stream. It even refused to answer the cell-phone. It was a burgeoning autodidact!

The Monkey’s vision went from peripheral to panoramic. When it returned to the microscope, the Monkey saw that the device had kept growing, just like the Monkey’s knowledge. Its nozzle kept getting bigger, bigger, bigger.

The microscope got so big that the Monkey flipped it around and “It’s a telescope!!! Ain’t this something beautiful.” Now the Monkey was on another frontier, peering at all 13 constellations of our Milky Way Galaxy!

But its feet never left the ground. It took all the scientific knowledge it had acquired and thought about how to use that to better life for all creatures. All this knowledge was so heartening, that it increased its capacity to love and respect all.

Maybe people could be the same way.

After spending hours, days and weeks staring at the stars, the Monkey realized that despite everything it could see far away, there was a wonderful banana tree right in front of it.

information about New Signature, a Washington DC tech solutions and consulting firm

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