If you can’t eat it, why dish it.

It was a beautiful Monday morning, I was excited at the prospects the new week would bring. I dressed myself in my beautiful white shirt and matching flared skirt. I realised that for every time I wore the shirt, I added a new admirer to my list so how best to start a new week if not with my charming white shirt. At about 6:00am I rushed out of the house to catch a bus because my car was at the mechanic’s, but that Monday morning had a different plan. A rainy plan, I quickened my pace as the clouds began to gather in the sky. The drops became larger, the sprinkles turned into a heavy downpour. ‘Oh, my charming white shirt’ I started to run for cover. But as I looked up I saw my friends car approaching and I heaved sigh of relief, at least I was about to bid this Monday morning woe goodbye. You can imagine my surprise when my friend met me down the street, wound down, waved at me and then like magi drove off. What was that? For real, infact I just couldn’t comprehend. The next time she saw me, she told me she was sorry she couldn’t help the other day, she was running late and couldn’t spare few minutes. I didn’t utter a word.
Few weeks after this episode, something happened, it was like a replay in reverse, the only difference was that it was unintentional. I was on my way to work one morning when my phone started ringing repeatedly, it was my friend who had dumped me in the rain. I couldn’t pick because I was driving and I didn’t want any trouble with LASTMA officials. Immediately I got to work, I gave her a call and she gave me a cold response, telling me not to worry as it was too late. I insisted and asked her to tell me what was wrong, she said I passed her on the street that morning and I didn’t pick her up. Said she was upset I would do something like that to her and she cut the call. I was over shocked. I didn’t see her at all to begin with, secondly she did the same to me few weeks ago without any justifiable reason and I didn’t fry her, thirdly it wasn’t raining, she wasn’t freezing yet she felt she had a right to be angry and I didn’t. By the way she didn’t talk to me for almost two months. SWEET
I travelled to the United Kingdom sometime last year and I got my brother a very lovely Nike sneakers. He had always wanted to have one and when I gave him those shoes he almost cried in excitement. I marvelled at how a guy could be so in love with a pair of sneakers. Few days after my arrival, Fola, my brother’s best friend came by the house and saw the sneakers, he was absolutely in love with them, maybe not as much as my brother was but he was in awe it. Then he started to beg my brother for it but he refused blatantly but you know how it is when you have a friend turned family who doesn’t take NO for an answer. My brother didn’t ask him to take it but he did and said this one is mine and there’s nothing you can do about it. My brother was pained but things we do for love.
Not long after then, Fola got a beautiful gold wristwatch from his uncle and somehow it caught my brother’s eyes and he asked for it, Fola refused obviously but my brother insisted. It turned into a fight and Fola went on social media to write how annoying it is when people take your things without you willingly giving it to them. He didn’t talk to my brother until he eventually returned the wrist watch. DELICIOUS
It was my lover’s birthday and one of my friends sent him a message with a gift, I felt the message was a bit too much and inappropriate, it sent a wrong signal. She said it was nothing and I should be grateful. On her man’s birthday I sent almost the same message and she turned everything upside down, she told me to my face that I had an ulterior motive. Till date she hasn’t spoken to me after the incident. NICE
I borrowed a friend some money last year March, she promised to return at the end of the month but she didn’t and she didn’t even apologise for the delay in payment. Sometime in August someone bought a dress from her and didn’t pay as at when agreed. Just a week after she was already complaining to me that she hasn’t been paid for the dress, she said it was annoying and inappropriate for people to owe without putting others into consideration. But here I was six months after she requested for a loan, No payment, No apology. RIGHT 
A friend of mine lied to me about buying something. I knew she bought it because I found it where she kept it but I didn’t say anything. Soon after that episode I told her a lie about going to visit a friend and she flipped. She shouted and cursed, told me we couldn’t be friends if I was lying to her. I was thinking she did the same thing to me, but she wouldn’t take it. She could lie to me but she didn’t have the decency to take a lie from me rather she made me look like the evil person and tried to put all the blame on me. WOW
These experiences may seem little and random but these very little episodes are the very essence of life. The thought that others deserve to be treated wrongly but we deserve to be treated right. The thought that others can hurt and feel pain but we can’t. The thought that we can be the reason why another person is weak, tired and in fear but we deserve better. The thought that we deserve better than others. 
Usually most acts of violence and evil stem from the fact that we think we must do everything to feel better, it doesn’t matter how the other person feels. People who rob and steal from others must think they deserve to have those things at all cost so even if they don’t work for it, they can take from others because they deserve it.
We all think that we deserve better than we get, we want that which is perfect and beautiful and we are to do whatever it takes: lie to people, cheat, be unavailable to loved ones, break bonds and trust. 
We are not all perfect but we can try our best. It doesn’t matter what we feel we deserve we must not hurt others to find that comfort. We must not do things to others that we are not willing to take ourselves.
No one is immuned to hurt or pain, we can’t hurt others and run away from hurt ourselves. What goes around comes around. If you cannot eat it, don’t dish it.
The bible admonishes us to do unto others as we would have them do to us. There is a reason it is called the golden rule. It is because it is the benchmark from which all actions stem. Before you act, think about it, will I be happy if this was done to me? If you wouldn’t please refrain. It is the highest form of hypocrisy.
We are not perfect and we hurt people, even those ones we do not want to hurt, we end up hurting them. But if we make a resolve to try one action at a time, if we think about every action, see through Gods eyes and treat others the way we would want to be treated. Then the world will be on its way to becoming a better place one action at a time.
Sometimes the pain and hurt is not in the tears or talks. It is in the fake smiles, the closed lips, the heartbeat and even the faintest sigh.
We do not know the amount of pain we cause others until we are served from the same dish.