Don't be a phony.

I have a situation for you...
You are sitting there at opening exercises for mutual, minding your own business when suddenly there is the laurel president. She asks you to play the opening song. Panic attacks immediately. You haven't even looked at the piano, let alone played it, in months. Of course you say yes, it would be rude not to. You hastily thumb through the hymn book trying to find a song you can try to play. You stop on hymn 142, Sweet Hour of Prayer. It was the first one you learned, and you had it memorized at one point. It will do. It comes time to sing the opening song. You sit down at the piano, going through the chords in your mind. This is going to be interesting, you say to yourself. The introduction is unrecognizable. You PRAY that the rest of the hymn goes better. It doesn't. The congregation sings a cappella with some minor assistance from the piano. After everyone has been dismissed to their various activities, your friends come up to you. "Good Job!!!" they say. "I wish I was as good as you." You can't believe your ears. Are your friends DEAF or something?!?!? Couldn't they hear how you had totally killed the hymn? You shake your head in disbelief. You had already felt bad enough, but these false compliments added sprinkles to the already frosted cake. (Yes this is based upon a true experience.)

Now what can we learn from this? That we should practice the piano more? NO, though it couldn't hurt. That saying yes isn't always the best thing? NO. We should learn that false compliments are not good. They hurt more than they help. You may think you are being nice, but you are not! When someone messes up, you don't have to tell them, but you also don't have to make up lie to try to make them feel better. Instead, act like nothing bad happened. You feel you must, compliment them on something sincere. That way you feel fulfilled and your friend doesn't feel even worse.