Persuasion

The first time I persuaded a person, I was eleven. It was to get a new doll house. It seems so silly now but back then it was so important that it was the only thing that mattered. And then a push, a simple push in my mother's mind and suddenly getting me a new doll house became her top priority. I was young enough back then to believe I could have such powers and old enough to know how to use it.

The first incident had made me excited and I began to test the waters. Soon those playful persuasions increased in number. I did not comprehend the full extent of my powers, the wider picture eluded me. Perhaps it was better that way as who knows what my juvenile brain would do with such powers. If my learning came later I may have not realised how what I was doing was wrong.

My intentions were for once, in good interest, and perhaps that was what made it even more painful.  I was walking back home when I came across a homeless woman. She was sitting with her hands around her head and crying. I felt horrible and decided to help her. A thought came to me which at that time to me was like a stroke of genius. I decided to persuade her to be happy. I had never tampered with emotions before. This would be my first, but because of my past success, I was overconfident. I overdid it. That was all it took, one extra push. I completely wiped out her thoughts. The only thing that remained was the false sense of happiness that I gave her. It trumped over her mind, her sense of right and wrong. I didn't know this at that time. I was just glad that I could bring someone happiness.

The next day I saw her, but not her. She had gone crazy. I had never talked to her but simply looking at her was enough to know that something was wrong.  Her smile, the gleam in her eyes, they were all wrong. And I finally realized exactly what my power could do. She was homeless and had no family. Her mind perhaps was her only sanctuary, and I had robbed her of it. What I did was cruel; it didn't matter that the intentions were good at heart. I had driven her insane. 

Happiness is precious to us because it comes by so rarely. And there is a thing as too much happiness. I had learned my lesson but with a high price. I never forgot her and to this day I remember exactly what had happened to her. And I had never failed to remember exactly what persuasion can do.

The writer is a grade 7 student at Sir John Wilson School.