One of the story’s themes is that true understanding cannot be achieved without real-world experience. The events that happen to the narrator in the desert exemplify this theme. Even though the narrator learns much from listening to the prince’s story, it’s evident that learning the prince’s lessons through firsthand experience gives them a clarity that would not be attained otherwise. The narrator finds the well on his own—his guide, the prince, falls asleep and needs to be carried all night. In the end, the prince’s story provides only a blueprint to the narrator about how much he has been missing. To obtain the fulfillment he seeks, he must act on his own. By extension, Saint-Exupéry teaches us that we must ourselves act to learn the lessons in his story, although this moral is never made explicitly clear