Central Argument: We should not forget the traditional ways of expressing appreciation by using words such as “please” and “thank you.”
These days, I feel people around me only receive without giving. What annoys me the most is people’s behavior as if they deserve to only receive from the very first place. It’s interesting how the write of the article Please Read This Story, Thank You has similar thoughts as mine. Words of appreciation such as “please” and “thank you” seem to disappear day by day. Through my experiences and observations, I realized that expressing appreciation is very important and should not be forgotten.
I myself have experienced several times the unpleasantness when people don’t appreciate. One day, I was asked by my classmate to help her with her homework. Honestly, she wasn’t a really close friend of mine, but I gladly agreed to help her. As I helped her with her work at that moment she asked me, I had to change my plans of my study timings. Though I knew I will have another sleepless night by helping her out, I chose to be a nice classmate and helped her get through the work as much as I needed. However, the moment I was a little uncertain with a part of the work, she started complaining that I am not smart enough to help her. She walked away without even saying two simple words, “thank you.”
My mom once told me about her unpleasant experience with people not knowing how to express appreciation. She helped one of her employees in her company to get through the difficult stage in her family. It is pretty rare to see a boss help out employee with family problems, but my mom wanted to be magnanimous and kind to all her employees. The employee got through with the family problems as my mom had spoken to that employee’s family members and sorted out the financial problems they faced. My mom was really glad that she could help. However, the very next month, the employee asked my mom to give her more money. He came into my mom’s office and simply said, “Give me more money. I need it.” First of all, there was no respect in the tone he asked. And most importantly, though he is the person who is in need and is asking a favor, he did not say “please.” My mom was terrified with the way her employee behaved towards her; she told me that people always think what they get is what they deserve, and they are not grateful at all. She was disappointed with her employee; her trust towards him broke completely, leading to firing him.
Many students say that teachers favor certain students. And perhaps, it may be true. However, once I started noticing the characteristics of students favored by teachers, I couldn’t deny teachers’ understandable preposition towards them. Students favored by teachers are polite, and by that, polite means their frequent use of“please” and “thank you” to teachers. Whether they ask teachers for help, questions, or even extensions for their homework, they never forget to appreciate the teachers’ kindness to permit their favors.
And of course, teachers unconsciously fall for these expressions of appreciation from those students, and thus favor these students. Even teachers are humans; they can’t help having more positive opinion about certain students than about other students who don’t care enough to appreciate teachers. The use of words “thank you” and “please” are such magical words. I’ve observed that students favored by teachers aren’t necessarily the clever and hard-working ones; some students who don’t even study still are favored by teachers just because of their behavior.
The use of these magical words “thank you” and “please” seems to be disappearing day by day. I am sure that most of the people would have experienced the unpleasantness of not being appreciated when they help others. We learn, as children, the way to respond when we receive help from others. It’s not very difficult, but it has great values and power to make people feel good about being appreciated. By accepting help from others happily and giving help to others happily by appreciating each other is the ideal way to cooperate in this independent society. We should not forget to express this appreciation. So, let’s use these words more often, “please” and “thank you.”
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