The boy and the hammer

 Do you know someone who has a bad temper? Perhaps you have a bad temper that you wish you didn't have. Can you imagine the damage such a temper can do to you and others? 

There once was a little boy who had a very bad temper. One day, bothered by his fits of temper, his father decided to hand him a bag of nails and said that every time the boy lost his temper, he had to hammer a nail into the back fence.

On the first day, the boy had driven 37 nails into that fence.

The boy gradually began to control his temper over the next few weeks, and the number of nails he was hammering into the fence slowly dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to control his temper than to hammer those nails into the fence.

Finally, the day came when the boy didn’t lose his temper at all. He proudly told his father the news and his accomplishment so the father suggested that the boy should now pull out a nail every day he kept his temper under control.

The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone. The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence.

“You have done well, my son, 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 man and draw it out. It won’t matter how many times you say I’m sorry, the wound is still there. Son, a verbal wound is as bad as a physica

l one or maybe worse”

 

Moral of the story: 
Wasn’t that a beautiful story with a valuable lesson? Isn’t it a reminder most us need from time to time?
Everyone gets angry sometime or the other and some of us even have a bad temper, and that’s alright. But remember, once the scars are formed, they take a long time to heal.
Control your anger, and don’t say things to people in the heat of the moment, that you may later regret. Some things in life, you are unable to take back.