Temptations

After college today, my mummy, sister and I had a chat. We talked about how am I settling into college, how was my day and how were my classes like.

Then, we talked about something interesting for me. During lunch today, some of my classmates invited me to join them for lunch at a nearby shopping centre. This will require us to leave campus, which is allowed. However, I had books to buy and other things to do, so I turned down the offer.

My mummy and sister told me that I should never join them on these kind of outings. Once I start, I may start having bad habits, such as skipping class or not studying hard. Then, I will fail my exams or not get good results, resulting in a waste of a year. They say that I should not put myself in temptation. Mummy even let me use her as an excuse. This means I can just tell my classmates my mother does not let me leave campus, and she is strict about this rule.

It sounds like as if my mummy and sister are trying to be controlling, not letting me make my own decisions. However, I think there is truth in their words. Temptation is dangerous, and it's not something we should knowingly put ourselves into. Let me explain why.

For example, there's a pile of gold coins on the floor, and a girl walks up to it. She stares at it, awed by the pile. She starts counting the number of coins, and she calculates the total value of them. She eventually takes the gold with her, even though she knows that she is stealing the gold. She does not care, as she wants the gold coins for herself.

On the other hand, a boy walks up to the pile of gold coins, and stares at it. He is awed by the pile, and admires it. However, he does not let himself count the number of coins. He walks away, and reports it to the nearest police station.

The boy was the one who did not put himself into temptation. He resisted, and did the right thing. The girl was the one who put herself into temptation. She counted the gold coins, which swayed her to do the wrong thing.

In short, temptation isn't bad. It's only bad and dangerous if we let it progress to sin.

This picture is to represent how temptation can look like:
I'm on a diet, but I allow myself to admire cakes.
This may cause me to break my diet.