A wonderful story happened more than a hundred years ago in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York City. A poor family had two children: a six-year-old girl and a twelve-year-old boy. The boy was very diligent in his Torah studies, and his father was very proud of him. There wasn't much food in the home. The only food on Shabbos was challah and cake.
On the Shabbos after Pesach, at the meager Shabbos seudah, the six-year-old girl went to her room, returned with some stale cake, and gave it to her brother. She said, "I am proud of you because you learn Torah. Therefore, when mother served cake for the past few weeks, I didn't eat it all. I saved a bit so that I can give it to you. The small amounts have accumulated, and now I can present you with this cake."
There was a problem. Pesach had passed, so the cake was הפסח עליו שעבר חמץ, and it was forbidden to be eaten. The father praised his daughter for admiring Torah so much and blessed her that she should marry a talmid chacham. (He also told his family that they should cover the chametz because it needed to be burned, as it was chametz from Pesach.)
Indeed, she married a talmid chacham. She married Reb Moshe Feinstein zt'l. The point we want to make from this story is that the father didn't shatter his daughter's appreciation for Torah. He didn't shout at her for making this mistake. Instead, he praised her, saying that she is a special girl who loves Torah and respects her brother. This increased her love for Torah. Had he admonished her for hiding chametz over Pesach, it would have broken her and perhaps her admiration for Torah, too.
After the Holocaust, in the home of the Nesivos Sholom of Slonim zt'l, a child spilled wine, messing up the Shabbos table. The Nesivos Sholom and the entire family kept calm, and no one rebuked the child for his negligence.
There was a guest in their home at the time. She wasn't religious. As was common among some Holocaust survivors, she had lost her emunah r”l. This episode brought her back. She said, "Some families consider a clean tablecloth to be more important than a child's feelings. But I saw in this home that the child's feelings were more important than a clean tablecloth," and that expression of good middos brought her back to Yiddishkeit.
At the tish of one of the Lubavitcher Rebbes, a person sat and ate matzah dipped in red beet borscht. The Rebbe didn't permit anyone to rebuke him. He explained, "Better that the matzos should turn red than this person's face should turn red."
A rosh yeshiva once said to Reb Shlomo Zalman Auerbach zt'l, "Your life is like living in Gan Eden. You don't have enemies. Everyone loves you. No one tries to harm you. But I feel that my life is Gehinom. Many people try to harm me, to take away my parnassah, and I suffer in other ways..." When the rosh yeshiva left the house, Reb Shlomo Zalman told his family, "He claims that he lives in Gehinom and that I live in Gan Eden. I say that he created the Gehinom for himself. He says that I live in Gan Eden. That's because when someone wants to push me back a step, I go back two steps on my own, and therefore my life is Gan Eden.
Chazal say that the Yidden in the desert lost their portion to Olam HaBa. This can be explained because the nation chose a lifestyle of complaining, as it states (Bamidbar 11:1) ויהי 'ה באזני רע כמתאוננים העם, "The people took to seeking complaints..." And when they sinned with the meraglim, Chazal say that they cried for no reason, and therefore they were punished to cry with a reason (for the churban Beis HaMikdash).
So, we see that a person chooses the type of life to live. If he is wise, he chooses a life of joy. The Chazon Ish zt'l said, "Everyone goes through this world. Some cry and some laugh; it is better to pass through the world with laughter." The choice is in our hands because it isn't a person’s situation that determines his happiness or the opposite; instead, the person's attitude affects how he will pass through this world.
