Baked Nuts

"Baaaaaked nuts...one fuh a dollar". The call of a nutseller plying her trade as I drove home recently. Consider the nuts that she sells: they have two components - the nut and the seed. Sometimes you take a nut out of the pack and it has a cracked shell, or a shell with a blemish; however, the nut inside is perfect in every way. On the other hand, you grab a nut whose shell may be gleaming; but, the seed contained within is rotten. You may even get a nut whose shell and seed are perfect in every way imaginable. Which nuts do you consume? Surely not the ones with the rotten seeds, even though their shells are unblemished! We consume the nuts that have seeds that are worthwhile and unblemished.

As it is with nuts, so it is with people: all of us have shells and seeds. As we meander through life, judge not the shells of those that you encounter but, rather, their seeds. Remove those nuts from your life whose seeds are rotten even though their shells may be perfect. Cherish those whose seeds are worthwhile, regardless of whether or not their shells are unbroken.