I believe that we should be more emphatic to people. There are people whose attitudes might not be the best, but we don’t know what has happened to them or is happening. People can have serious issues and we just treat them the same way as they treat us, then what is that going to solve?, I think if we put ourselves in their shoes, we can slowly fix the world.
   

There was a time when I would go and help my mom with an after school program. I remember there was one boy who nobody wanted to be friends with. He was rude and said some very disgusting words that I didn’t even know. The teachers tried knocking some sense into him, but he just didn’t care. He disrespected everyone. No one knew what to do with him. He was just a mess and none of us knew why.
   

My mother always told me that someone acts a certain way for what happens in their household or their experiences. She said to look in the eyes, for the eyes say everything no matter how hard you try to hide your emotions. So one day I took one simple look into his eyes and I saw what they held. Hatred, hurt, anger. It hurt me just to see that, so in my head I wondered “How can I change that?”

The first thing that came to my mind was to show him what love looks like “You can’t drive out darkness with darkness, only light can do that. You can’t drive out hate with hate only love can do that.” That is Martin Luther King Jr. said. That inspired me to show that ten-year-old boy who was lost some love. I started with doing small acts of kindness. I would hold the door open for him; I helped him with his homework even though he was reluctant. I gave him true compliments like “I like your green eyes” or I would even ask him if he needed someone to talk I was there. I did small acts like that that showed him I care for about a month. We all started to see a difference. First his grades started to go up. A week later he got to the program early to help set up. He was using being more respectful to the kids and the adults. He actually wanted to start helping the younger children with their homework. Soon he was attempting to start making friends.

Everything was going great and he was still kind, but my mind kept nagging me on why was his heart full of hurt? Then we all found out that he was in foster care for eight years. Not only that, but he was also physically and emotionally abused as a child.

We don’t always know what happens to people and we may never know, but if we keep shutting them out because of how they act what good is that? So I say rethink on how you are going to treat people because maybe all they need is some love in their life, someone to listen to them, or even as simple act as letting them borrow a pen. If we try to understand them and not treat them badly because of their behavior, you can make a difference in their life.