Junaid was going through the market-place of the town with his disciples. A man was dragging his cow by a rope, and Junaid said ’Wait’ to the man. The man stopped and Junaid asked his disciples ’I ask you one thing: who is bound to whom? Is the cow bound to this man or is this man bound to this cow?’ Of course, the disciples said ’the cow is bound to the man. The man is the master, he is holding the rope, and the cow has to follow him wherever he goes. He is the master and the cow is the slave.’ And Junaid said ’Now, see.’ He took out his scissors and cut the rope – and the cow escaped. The man ran after the cow, and Junaid said ’Now look what is happening! Now you see who the master is; the cow is not interested at all in this man – in fact, she is escaping.’ And the man was very angry, he said ’What kind of experiment is this?’ But Junaid said to his disciples “this is the case with your mind.” All the nonsense that you are carrying inside is not interested in you. You are interested in it, you are keeping it together somehow – you are becoming mad in keeping it together somehow. But you are interested IN it. The moment you lose interest, the moment you understand the futility of it, it will start disappearing; like the cow it will escape.» It doesn›t mean who runs away is the master. The story simply tells us of the things we are holding on to. Our thoughts, our worries, our mind, our illusions. It could be the fish that was holding on to the net.
