A Good Story for
Great Friends
There
once was a little girl who had a bad temper. Her mother gave her a
bag of
nails and told her that every time she lost her temper, she must
hammer
a nail into the back of the fence.
The
first day the girl had driven 37 nails into the fence. Over the next
few
weeks, as she learned to control her anger, the number of nails
hammered
daily gradually dwindled down. She discovered it was easier to
hold
her temper than to drive those nails into the fence.
Finally
the day came when the girl didn't lose her temper at all. She told
her
mother about it and the mother suggested that the girl now pull out
one
nail for each day that she was able to hold
her temper..
The
days passed and the young girl was finally able to tell her mother
that
all the nails were gone. The mother took her daughter by the hand and
led her
to the fence. She said, "You have done well, my daughter, but look
at the
holes in the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say
things
in anger, they leave a scar just like this one." You can put a knife in a
person
and draw it out. It won't matter how many times you say I'm sorry,
the
wound is still there. A verbal wound is as bad as a physical one.
Friends
are very rare jewels, indeed. They make you smile and encourage
you to
succeed. They lend an ear, they share words of praise and they
always
want to open their hearts to us.