Hurt people, hurt people.

That is neither a reason nor excuse to be disrespectful. Just because you were wronged in the past, doesn’t mean you get to wrong somebody else.

You know how much it hurts, what it’s like to feel low; you should never treat someone that way just to feel better about yourself.

The golden rule is to treat others the way you want to be treated – not how you were treated. Respect goes a long way.

I hear stories about people who were bullied in middle school who go to high school and become the biggest bully. Knowing that the big high school bully knows EXACTLY how much it hurts, makes my skin crawl.

I don’t like bullies in general, but the fact that you’ve felt that pain before and you want others to feel it too. You are the worst kind of person. Just because you felt negative once doesn’t mean you should make sure everyone around you feels it too.

I feel like if someone has felt pain and sadness, they should make sure others don’t feel it.

As the great Robin Williams once said, “I think the saddest people always try their hardest to make people happy because they know what it’s like to feel absolutely worthless, and they don’t want anyone else to feel like that.”

Now if you tell me that you didn’t love Robin Williams, or was not saddened by his death, then you wouldn’t understand. Williams was suffering from depression, but was still able to put a smile on everyone’s face.

He would visit children suffering in hospitals to make them happy about something. He would make everyone laugh with his movies. He always wanted everyone to be happy.

This is exactly how anyone who is down should treat others. You shouldn’t turn your sadness into anger; it’s not healthy for you or the person you’re lashing out against.

I was bullied in middle and high school. I was bullied for about seven or eight years straight. I never turned around and tried to bully others. I continued to be nice, hoping the bullying would stop. I continued just being me. I didn’t want others to suffer like I did. I would defend and protect anyone so they were not alone.

I knew what it was like to be put down. And when I heard some of my bullies were once bullied, it made me feel sorry for them – that this was the only way they knew how to make themselves feel better.

My high school basketball coach had a poster. It read, “Attitudes are contagious, is yours worth catching?”

No one truly likes a bully. No one deserves to get bullied. Be the bigger person and break the cycle of hurt people who hurt people.

Brittany McClintock can be reached at [email protected] or @B_McClintock17 on Twitter.