A gardener had worked for his master for many years before a newer, more skillful gardener was hired by the master and began to threaten his position. The elder gardener was an older guy, who was heavy-set and slow, and getting slower. Meanwhile, the newer gardener was a young adult that was fit and in much better shape. The new gardener was perfect for the job because he was in the best shape to achieve his tasks. It could be understood why he would get hired for the job, but in addition to the original gardener, he seemed pointless. The original gardener was quite fond of his master and his job, and vice versa. So, you could imagine that he was certainly worried that the newer gardener would take his job. Although if he has such history with the master, why would he get rid of him?

The senior gardener asked himself, “How could he get rid of me without even letting me know?”

The original gardener just figured that he needed an extra hand since he was slowing down from age. After all, he was practically elderly. However, that did not stop the original gardener from being worried about losing his job. It still didn’t entirely make sense that the master would hire another person if he did such a good job alone for all those years.

He didn’t communicate with the new gardener too much, as he felt like he was about to rob him of his career. The original gardener figured that he would have to step up his work so that it would be harder for the newer gardener to make too much of an impression on the master. He wanted to at least form an uneasy comparison so that the master could not easily chose one over the other if he’d decided to. So, that was precisely what the gardener began doing. He worked extremely hard despite him being extremely frail and incapable. He knew that he was risking his life for his job, but it did not stop him. He continued to work hard and try to prove that he was worthy of his position. It got to the point where the elder gardener felt that he would have to try to eliminate the gardener entirely. So, the elder gardener began to sabotage all the newer gardener’s work. He started to make concoctions that were harmful to the new gardeners’ plants and would poison them. He wanted to make the new gardener look as unskilled as possible so that rather than himself lose the job, the other gardener would lose his.

Every now and then, he would see the master have a conversation with the new gardener as if he were doing something wrong. He finally thought that his plan had worked all along. He felt that his hard work finally paid off. However, after some time, he seen that the gardener was just still there, working, like normal. He realized that nothing was happening to the new gardener. At that point, the elder gardener figured that he would just have to continue to work hard because there was no way he could get rid of him. The elder gardener never lowered his standards again. He continued to work as hard as he could, and it ultimately put up quite the competition for the newer gardener. The elder gardener knew that he was risking his life to keep his job. But he felt that it was his life’s work, his dream job. He felt that if his job was gone, so was his life. He had worked the same job for so long that it had actually become a part of his life. He didn’t have any family to care for him or that he could care for, so his job and everything around it was basically all he knew.

One day, the elder gardener decided that he would finally talk to the master to get an understanding of what was going on. He asked the master why he’d hired another gardener.

“Why did you hire another gardener master?” the original gardener asked.

To which the master told him that he was getting too old and couldn’t do the work on his own anymore as he used to. The gardener understood and told the master that he had originally felt threatened by the other gardener’s presence and thought that he would lose his job. The gardener said, “I thought that you hired him so that you could replace me.” The master didn’t understand why the elder gardener would believe that after all of the years that he’s worked for him, he would ever replace him so easily. The master knew that that job was his life’s work realized the importance of the job to the gardener. The elder gardener felt relieved that the master understood and finally stopped viewing the gardener as competition, but rather as a partner. The elder gardener began to talk more and more to the new gardener, and they began to develop a friendship. While together, they each discussed their knowledge on plants and other work-related things. As time went on, their friendship continued to develop. They soon grew to be close friends. Their friendship made the senior gardener realize that he should not assume the worst in people because what he believed turned out to be false.