Self-Improvement

This story is about learning not to tell lies. I faced great difficulty to learn this. I faced many mental obstacles that I intend to highlight. We four cousins were living together in the city of Gujranwala in Punjab, an old city of India, now part of Pakistan. This city is known as the birthplace of Ranjit Singh, the founder of a great Empire of Sikhs. We four were kids and studying in different grades varying from grades five to seven. We wanted to see a Punjabi movie, “Dulla Bhatti," who was a Punjabi Robin Hood. He used to snatch wealth from rich people and deliver it to the poor. The problem was our parents only allowed us to see movies on weekends. Our collective desire was to see the movie before the weekend. We didn't have the moral courage to express our desire and seek permission to see the movie. We four made a secret plan to bunk from evening tuition class and make it to the evening show in summer. It was a new movie and attracted a large crowd. It was difficult for us to buy the tickets through the window. The owner of the cinema was known as "Palwan jee" (the wrestler), and he used to sit in the cinema on a very large bed that could accommodate six to eight people at a time. We approached him, paid the money and purchased the tickets through him. When we came out, it was a pitch-dark night. We normally used to arrive at home before sunset. We jointly decided to tell a second lie, which was that the teacher had kept us busy. Probably strong desires stopped us to from acting correctly. With tensions and fears, we told our cover story and our parents accepted it. But our elder sister, who had had her graduation recently, did not accept our cover story because we had never before been late whenever we attended the class. Our sister said, "Take me to your teacher!"

We never expected that our statement would be challenged. En route, it was an ideal opportunity to take our sister into our confidence and confess the truth. Our brains did not have the experience to handle such a shameful and intricate situation. Our neurological level and brain cells could not give us an alternate solution to handle the situation. Our brains were blocked with these obstacles, so we innocently took her to our teacher, who rightly refuted our statement. We got belittled not only at home but also at school as our teacher made fun of us in the class. After that, we never again bunked our class or told lies to the family. This embarrassment and guilt became part of the memories of the four of us forever.

To conclude, our conduct was not proper because we lacked the skill to communicate our desires, feelings and emotions. I suggest that parents and teachers should teach kids communication skills. Also, they should teach them how to remove mental obstacles faced by them.