Placing Label on Someone
One day, a student in school thought it would be fun to play a prank on one of his classmates. He took a paper and wrote on it – I am Stupid. He then took that paper and stuck it on the back of his classmate, without getting noticed. When other students saw this, he asked them not to tell him about it.
The last class of the day was mathematics. The professor wrote a very difficult problem on the board and asked who thought they could answer it. No student raised their hand, except for one —the boy who had a paper stuck to his back.
The professor called him to come to the front of the class and solve that problem before him on the blackboard. While the student was walking towards the front, all the students were making fun of him behind his back. The professor noticed the note but said nothing.
While the students were snickering, the boy solved that problem. He was about to go back to his seat when the professor stopped him and praised him for solving such a difficult problem. He then removed the paper that was stuck on his back. He gave it to the boy and said, “This was stuck to your back.” When the student saw that paper, he felt embarrassed.
Then the professor faced towards the rest of the class and said, “Let me tell you something… Throughout your life, people will put labels on you… you are stupid, you are too old, your too small…yes, they will put labels on your back with many bad things written on it to stop your from growing or succeeding or being happy. If this student had known about paper on his back, that he would not have gotten up to solve the problem. All you have to do in life is ignore these labels people give you and use every chance you have to learn, grow and improve yourself, then you will find happiness.”