Fantastic short story with a big moral.

It's important to point out though that you can't have one without the other... you need a mug to drink the coffee, and you need work, money, a job, family, etc. in order to have a life.  Of course it is better to focus on the coffee, life itself.... but that is very difficult to do.  Life is made up of all these elements, this is the way we live our daily lives.  If we don't take each of these elements and enjoy them as well, then life will pass us by and we won't know what happened, we won't understand why we didn't enjoy life more, when it's about to all be over.  Just some more thoughts.  Thanks for the story.

I hope he had brown sugar and cinammon for the coffee, just kidding! :o) It is a very inspiring story with a nice moral for all of us students to learn. Thanks for sharing.

that was very enlightening...but maybe my life wants to be surrounded by beautiful things?and to enhance my life,i put it in a fancy beautiful mug:)

that would be like taking a beautiful girl and making her wear rags....

sure,the girl is beautiful but the rags dampen her beauty....

I think that the whole point that the professor wanted to make was that the mug just holds the coffee and it is the coffee that you drink and taste. If you have a tasteless coffee, it doesn´t matter how pretty and expensive the mug is, you just won´t enjoy it! But if it is a good quality coffee, well made and full of taste, it doesn´t matter if it´s inside of a not so attractive and cheap mug (or in a pretty and expensive one).  Just as if one´s life is not so great, it doesn´t matter how high up the ladder you are in your career and how many assets you have or not. How many people are very successful in their respective careers, have nice families and live a comfortable life and yet they are unhappy? On the other hand, how many people are just happy with having a job to sustain themselves and their families and yet they are happy?

Yes, there are a lot of unhappy people no matter whether their elements (mug) are so great or not and others that are just happy because happiness begins with the self (coffee).  

Hi,oron! Your story is deep,this is true-but how does this stand up?--Though MY mug is broken,I'll STILL enjoy my coffee from a styrofoam cup! Have a good one!  

This reminds me of a story I was once told: A man was on vacation in Africa - on a safari. At one point as they were observing a herd of elephants, a large young bull came between them and their vehicle. It came up to the man, lifted it's front leg, trumpeted, and swung it's trunk side to side, and then stood there. After a few minutes, the man approached and saw a large bit of wood stuck into the elephant's foot. He managed to remove the wood, and the elephant backed off, lifted it's front leg, trumpeted, swung it's trunk side to side and then turned and rushed off. Years later the man and his son were visiting the zoo in a large town. When they came to the elephant exhibit, one of the large bulls looked at the man standing over the dividing wall: the elephant lifted his leg, trumpeted, swung his trunk side to side, and then stood there. The man couldn't believe his eyes; he climbed over the rail and approached the elephant who gently reached down with his trunk, grabbed the man by his ankles, and then smashed him into the railing. Must have been a different elephant. I do like your story though: and I agree ---- life is measured in how you live it, not by what you accumulate ------- unless, of course, you are the heir : then all that accumulated stuff can be quite nice.

Very nice story.  I like it and there is a lot of lesson to learn.  Lesson:  Not all materials things make people happy.