Krishna Pendyala
Author of Beyond the PIG and the APE

“My favorite book was The Ant and the Cricket. The message of the story is a good one: We should think ahead and work for the future, not just seek pleasure in the moment. For a long time in my life I acted as if these options were in fact the only two. I tried being a good little Ant, working so hard to become an academic whiz that the other kids wondered how I did it, until it nearly drove me nuts. Later I tried escaping into Crickety pleasures, but that wasn’t the answer either. Eventually I noticed a problem that seems to run through both approaches to life. Either way, you’re constantly chasing things and avoiding things. This story motivated me to discover if there was a way to act with foresight, like the Ant, and be filled with profound happiness and joy—not just the Cricket’s kind of fair-weather pleasure.”