| The Joy of Service |
Chapter 2 |
Page 6 |
Then, what is worse, they not only let their own spirits be disturbed by these trivial incidents of pain or inconvenience, but they must needs make everyone they meet share their miserable dispiriting. They carry the dark shadow of their unhappy feeling on their face. They chafe and fret when things do not go well. They pout and sulk like spoiled children when they do not get their own way. If they have not slept well, or if they have a headache, or a cold, or a discomfort of any kind, however trivial, they compel every one who salutes them courteously throughout the day to listen to the recital of all the tiresome story of their maladies.
Could any habit be more utterly selfish than this? Do persons imagine that the neighbours who inquire kindly after their health have any pleasure in listening to such an unwholesome tale of woe, often about nothing but some imaginary ailment? Does any one think that he has a right to pour such a burden of complaining into any human ear? Every noble man is ready to extend sympathy in any case of real trouble; but there is no call for sympathy in such ailments as to make up the staple to the complaints which many of us have to tell our neighbours about. This is one of the human habits concerning which it were well if some power would “the giftie gie us to see oursel’s as others see us.” We only tire out our friends, and make it harder for them to live, while at the same time we add to our own wretchedness. For such miseries will grow if we nurse them, until by and by they become giants, and bind us hand and foot in hopeless bondage.
Far better is it for one to seal his lips resolutely and persistently against all such morbid talk, and speak only glad, joyous, encouraging things. This is one of the childish things we should put away as we become men, if we find ourselves indulging in it. It is unmanly and it is most unlovely. It is a grievous sin against others to inflict upon them our miserable hypochondrias. We should be scatterers of light, not of darkness; of good, not of evil; of inspiring influence, not of that which can make life harder for everyone we meet.
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