As a teenager, I was pretty lazy when it came to doing things for my family. I worked hard at school and I found I was usually not glad to1out at home with even the simplest things.

Every Wednesday afternoon, for example, my mother2me to another town for a piano lesson.

During my two-hour lesson, she rushed to the nearby market and bought a week's3. Knowing my mom had driven me twelve miles there, and twelve miles back, you might think I'd be very4to help her bring the food into the house.5I wasn't. I generally just brought my schoolbag and left the rest for Mom as I ran to my room, and then started studying.

Back in my room, I felt6not helping my mother more. Deep inside, I wanted to change my7. But I also realized that once I took on more housework, my parents would start8more of me. At the age of fifteen, I realized that this one small change would9something much bigger: my personal change from a cared-for child to a more10young man.

I'll never forget the Wednesday when I made a decision to change11. Returning home from the lesson, I rushed into my room, as usual. But once inside, I felt that deep and burning12again.

Throwing my school books on the bed, I suddenly opened my door and ran back to the gate to help my mother. How 13I looked at my mother when I finished it that day!

Surely, from then on, I continued to help outwith more housework. The clear thing was, the more I helped out, the14I felt about myself and my place in my family, as Mom and Dad realized they could live on me more.

Sometimes the little things we put off doing can be15easily. And then the feeling of being happy beats the feeling of being sorry any day.