The Great Boaster

The Great Boaster

Long ago, in southern Laos, there lived a man whom the village called the Great Boaster. People had almost stopped using his real name, for wherever he went, the conversation soon became a tale about his own amazing deeds. If someone said, “Yesterday I carried a heavy sack of rice all the way to the next village,” the Boaster would answer, “One sack? I once carried two, and I did not even grow tired!” If a hunter said, “In the forest, I heard a tiger very close by,” the Boaster waved his hand. “Is that danger? I once heard two tigers! They were probably frightened of me.” If anyone mentioned a long road, a hard rain, a steep hill, or difficult work, the Great Boaster always had a story that was longer, more frightening, and more unbelievable. At first, the villagers listened with curiosity. Then they began to doubt. Before long, when they saw him coming from a distance, they invented errands and slipped away. “Look, the Boaster is coming,” someone would whisper. “If we stay, by evening we will learn how he moved a mountain all by himself.” One day, a young man from a faraway place came to the village. He heard about the Great Boaster and was surprised. “Is he truly so strong?” he asked. “Perhaps he is strong,” the villagers said. “But his words are always stronger than he is.” The young man smiled. He was a quick runner and knew how to save his strength. But his greatest advantage was something else: he did not like to show off. The next morning, he met the Great Boaster near the market. “They say you are the most tireless person in the whole region,” he said. The Boaster stood straighter. “Not only in this region! Probably much farther still.” “Then shall we have a race?” A crowd gathered at once. “What kind of race?” asked the Boaster. The young man pointed to a low hill beyond the village. “We will run to the top. But there is one condition: I will try to breathe calmly all the way and take only a few deep breaths.” The Boaster snorted. “A few? I will take even fewer!” “You do not have to,” said the young man quietly. “The important thing is to reach the top.” “Perhaps that is important to you. I will show everyone true endurance!” The villagers agreed to walk beside the road and make sure the race was fair. “Ready?” asked the village head. The young man stood at the starting line. The Boaster drew in a deep breath, puffed out his cheeks, and decided he would prove that he could run while hardly breathing at all. “Go!” They ran. At first, the Boaster rushed ahead so quickly that he raised a cloud of dust. “Did you see that?” he managed to call. “That is speed!” But the road began to rise. The young man ran steadily: step, step, breathe in, breathe out. The Boaster grew redder and redder as he tried to keep his foolish promise. Soon he slowed down. A few more steps, and he stopped at last and took a loud breath. “Are you all right?” asked the young man, stopping too. “Of course,” said the Boaster, leaning on his knees. “I was only… checking the road.” “We can continue without strange rules,” the young man offered. “Let us simply run to the top.” Quiet smiles passed through the crowd. The Boaster stood up straight again. “If we were running downhill, I would win easily!” One villager could not hold back. “And if the hill were a plain and the plain were a boat, you would probably swim across the sky!” Everyone laughed. The Boaster turned even redder. But the young man did not laugh. “Listen,” he said. “You do not need to be the strongest every time. No one here asked you to run without breathing. You promised something impossible only because you wanted to say something bigger than I did.” The Boaster was ready with his usual story about a time when he had raced to a much taller mountain. He opened his mouth. Then he stopped. He looked at the people around him and noticed something for the first time. They did not admire his tales. They had stopped believing them long ago. “Do you truly avoid me because I boast so much?” he asked. An old neighbor answered honestly. “Not because you speak about yourself. But because when you are near, no one else has room to tell their own story.” Those words felt heavier to the Boaster than any sack of rice. That day, he did not reach the hilltop first. But something more important happened. When people gathered to talk that evening, the Great Boaster came and sat beside them. Someone was telling how he had repaired his roof before the rain. The Boaster wanted to say that he had once repaired three roofs in a single day. But he held back. “How did you manage it?” he asked instead. The neighbor looked at him in surprise and continued his story. Then someone else began to speak. Again, the Boaster simply listened. The whole evening passed that way. And a strange thing happened: when he stopped trying to outdo everyone, people stopped running away from him. Over time, the nickname “Great Boaster” was used only as a joke. The man truly became stronger—not because he learned to run without breathing or to carry impossible loads, but because he learned to say two difficult sentences. “I do not know how to do that.” And: “Tell me about yourself.” For real confidence does not need loud proofs. And sometimes the best way to become a more interesting companion is not to invent a bigger story about yourself, but to listen carefully to someone else’s.

May this story leave a little light in your heart ✨