Courage is fire, Bullying is smoke

Facebook these days is full of "I can’t believe this happened!!" posts. Well I came across one of them which had something to do with a teenager committing suicide due to bullying in school. It prompted me to search the internet about the similar cases and after reading numerous articles (sadly) about bullying at school and college I had to stop and think about exactly why students are forced to take such a drastic step.

At a first glance, it seems stupid why someone would kill himself/herself just because people called him/her ugly, or a nerd or something mean. We have seen it in a lot of teen-flicks where such a situation is presented in a funny way. All these movies have a happy ending. People come out of that phase and find their way in life to be triumphant and happy. You’d think it’s just a movie and such happy endings are not possible in real life. It’s all fiction, right? Well honestly no. This is how it should be and most of the times it is. What people call you in high school or college, what they think of you, what you are termed as, what you look like, it just doesn’t matter. We all are supposed to get past this.

You’d think I am just preaching but I say this from personal experience. And for that matter most of us have gone through some sort of bullying or "labeling" during our school years including immensely talented and famous people like Albert Einstein and Tom cruise. This behavior of others did affect me to some extent but I had the will power to actually keep myself going. It was because despite what everyone else thought of me I still had those few "special" people in my life who I call family and friends that loved me for who I really am. And the belief that I am special to them kept me going at that moment. Trust me, rest of them don’t matter. Today I am happy and successful and well, I don’t think I need to tell you how successful Tom Cruise is or Albert Einstein was!

But most of the teenage kids have a hard time accepting this fact and understanding what really matters. To them their social life at school is high priority. And if they are made fun of in school it hurts them to no extent. They take it very personally and at times we see the consequences are severe.

Also, in some cases the bullying is out of control and that’s when you need to stand up for yourself. You need to seek help. Talk to your parents or friends or someone you trust. There are a lot of forums out there to help you.

You can visit: http://www.stopbullyingnow.hrsa.gov/kids/

http://www.education.com/topic/school-bullying-teasing/

http://stopcyberbullying.org/

My message to all the people out there who are bullied in some way and have had thoughts of taking an extreme step would be to think of the people who love you because you mean the world to them. The people who bully you don’t care about you so you hurting yourself will not make a difference to them.

And people who bully other kids, well, they should not forget that tomorrow it could be them at a different place or it could be someone they love. What goes around comes around, right?

In the end I want to leave all of you with a famous quote which I always believed in :"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind."

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