Of ants and disciples

I've been thinking, as I progress along the Buddhist path, about how I must have done something right in a former life to be in the spot I am today, and oh how wonderful I am for that. I was a student of my current lama in a previous life, my imagination has told me. I'm big and important, even if it's not obvious in this life, so the mental narrative goes. I have been building up this view for quite a while. Then, suddenly, I remembered a story about Kalu Rinpoche. Once when he was younger he blessed many ants. Then many years later, he realized that many of the students that had come to him were actually reincarnations of the ants he had blessed! How quaint, I was thinking, when I first heard the story, but I finally realized my story may be similar. I could have been an ant in a previous life which an infinitely kind person blessed. Not so much to be prideful about anymore, although there remains a lot to be grateful for. :)