Conundrums of the will
A father left 17 camels as an asset for his three sons. Obviously when the father passed away his sons opened up the will only to learn that The father stated that the eldest son should have half of the 17 camels, the middle son should be given 1/3rd of 17 camels and the youngest son 1/9th of 17 camels.
They were puzzled as it is not possible to divide 17 into half or by 3 or by 9.This evoked a fight for the assets between the brothers.
Eventually they decided to go to a wiseman for arbitration.
They approached a wiseman who patiently listened about the will. After deep thinking the wiseman bought a camel of his own and added to the 17 camels which increase the count of camels to 18.
Now he started reading the deceased father’s will; again.
Half of 18 is 9
So he gave 9 camels to the eldest son.
1/3rd of 18 =6 camels to the second son.
1/9th of 18 =2 camels to the youngest son.
Now the surprise is when you add this up.
9+6+2=17 camels which leaves the wiseman to take his one camel back with him.
The attitude of negotiation and problem solving is to find the 18th camel and find the common ground even the difficult issues can be resolved.
However, to reach a solution , the first step is to believe that there is a solution. If we think that there is no solution , we won’t be able to solve any problems.