Do not pay for the wrongs of others.

The young man felt cheated. He believed he had been overcharged. He was angry. The words of the seller did not pacify him; it aggravated the situation. The young man could not contain his anger any longer. He forgot all he was taught about its control. There was a fight and the young man won. It ended with the death of the seller.

Though the seller was not faultless; for he had instigated the attack; the young man had to bear the responsibility of this death. He was sentenced to six years for manslaughter.

The young man had to pay for his anger and lost six years of freedom. The pain was not felt only by him. His parents suffered too. So did his siblings. And it all started with the wrong caused by the seller. The seller, after cheating him, had abused the power of words to put salt into the wound he had caused.

Therefore, it is important for parents to teach their children to control their thoughts and emotions, especially the destructive anger that has caused so much tragedy among humans.

How do we do it? As I have ilustrated before, the world is our audio-visual aids. Each time, anger brought misfortune to some poor souls, tell the children about it. Stress on the consequences of such acts of anger. Use the newspapers, magazines and the internet, their stories, pictures and videos to show that the people who wrong us would not suffer as much as ourselves.

In the above story, for example, the dead person stopped suffering the moment he died. The young man's suffering had to continue regretting not just during his years in prison but also forever, perhaps. He would return to his world as a convicted person. Would it be easy for him to find a living? Would it warp his mind sufficiently to have no opportunity to find peace of mind? Perhaps the pain and suffering might have to go on till his own death.

In any anger, whether it results in tragedy or not, the one who allows the anger to fester in his mind will be the one who hurts himself. The person who caused the anger would have forgotten that incident the moment the person whose heart he had pierced with hurting words had gone out of sight.

Sometimes, hurt comes from mere words. And there are people who are sadistic enough to enjoy angering others. To prevent such hurts, always remember that everyone else has the right to his own opinions. When we adopt such an attitude, others' words can never ever pierce into our hearts.

Others have the right to their opinions. That does not mean that we are any less better than what we are. Our self esteem, our value of ourselves, will stand in good steed. With a strong self-esteem, no words can reduce our own values! Our children must be taught that.

So, teach our children how to look at such barbed words and prevent anger so that they do not have to pay for the wrongs of others.