Aladdin

Whilst I was sitting outside this morning in my usual pre-coffee, pre-cigarette daze, I happened to suddenly unravel one of the great mysteries of the universe. Well, one of the lesser among the great, I suppose--not the answer to the meaning of life, or whether God exists, or of which comes first, the chicken or the egg. No. What I suddenly discovered is the solution to the three wishes granted by the genii in Aladdin's lamp.

You rub the lamp and the genii comes out in a cloud of smoke and tells you that he will grant three wishes. Most people expend these on pretty common sorts of things--money, love, super abilities and so on. But here's the key: One should use only two of these wishes on whatever he desires at the time, and save the third wish for making a request to go back in time to the moment just before you found the magic lamp. You go back to that moment, rub the lamp, a genii pops out and says "I will grant you three wishes, whatever you will!" Simple, right? But most people will burn their wishes and then say "Damn, I wish I had just one more wish!" 

One gets to the point in life where he as exhausted the capacity of the magic lamp. He has expended his wishes, and most probably they were foolish wishes. He understands that, and wishes that he had made different choices, but there are no wishes left. The lamp is empty.

 “At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. ² Five of them were foolish and five were wise. ³ The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them. ⁴ The wise ones, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps." (Matthew 25.1-4)

Keep oil in your lamp.