You can' t control or influence certain events in life-earthquake， sabotage， terrorist bombings， being struck by lightning， a freak traffic accident and so on. But you can control how you think and feel about such incidents， even when you are the unfortunate victim of an accident.
You can choose to moan and groan about your misfortune， about what you have lost physically or financially. Or you can choose to count your blessings that you are still alive， that you have most of your physical or mental faculties. A prolonged negative attitude would make you miserable and regressive whereas a change to a positive attitude would spur you to think of possibilities.
You could be taunted or discriminated against if you lost a leg， arm or an eye. You can' t help some insensitive people doing such things. If you fret over what is said and what has been deprived of you， does it make you any happier， determined， persevering or resourceful？
The right attitude to take is not to let insults， sarcasm， rudeness， ridicule or mockery bother you. Why respond negatively to such behaviours of other people？ It doesn' t pay to strike back contemptuously at them. If you do， you are showing that you are emotionally weaker.
Show that you are emotionally stronger， that you do not have to trade insults with insults， that what they say or do does not bother you at all. Show the dignity that they do not have.
The pain is not in what the insensitive people say about you or do to belittle you. The pain is in how you interpret and react to such acts.
Very often， we negatively over-react to， or "read" too much into， what people say or do. It' s a case of seeing what we want to see， regarding an issue as big when it could really be insignificant.
Even if people in reality are downright inhuman， you can choose to ignore their behaviour or not view it negatively at all. That is real self mastery.