Yelling

In one of his books, Robert Fulghum tells a remarkable story.

He writes about the natives in the Solomon Islands who have a unique form of tree logging. If a tree is too big to be felled with an ax, the loggers start yelling at it.

Here is how they do it. They gather before daylight and surround the tree. Just as the sun is coming over the horizon, they start yelling at the top of their voices at the tree. They continue this practice every day for thirty days. After that time, it is believed that the tree dies on the inside. Yelling kills the spirit of the tree. Then it is easy to cut down.

There is a lot of truth in the theory of those Solomon Islanders. Yelling does kill people's spirits. When we yell at our spouses, our children, our neighbors, or people who cut us off on the highway, we kill their spirit.

We don't like it when people yell at us. Why would we do it to others?