This morning my tenants messaged me with awful news - half my chickens had been slaughtered by two foxes. She was a mess. She felt awful that she hadn't managed to keep them safe until we got back - and she had gotten herself awfully attached to them, which meant she basically stood at the coop and cried her eyes out whilst her boyfriend ran around trying to find the missing ones.

Of course, there were two ways for me to respond to this - firstly, I could have seriously reprimanded her. What part of the instruction to not let the chooks out before 9 am did she not understand? Part of me was annoyed. That's okay. We can have responses that move on through and not act upon them. That's the kicker. Watch your reactions.

How many of us have reacted badly to something that someone did that essentially wasn't entirely their fault, or was a complete accident, or had no malicious intent? It's usually because we want others to feel as bad as we do - a transference of emotion that has no rational basis and can be quite cruel, even if we don't entirely mean to be.

We need to ask ourselves whether doing so will fix the situation. It never, ever does.

Could you have made the same mistake?
How would you feel in this situation?
Will reprimanding or making the other person feel guilty fix things?

It was my empathy - my second reaction - that won out rather quickly, I'm pleased to say. This feeling of compassion and understanding flooded in and swamped my initial anger, which burnt out in seconds.

The bottom line is that it's okay to feel anger, frustration, sadness or other emotions, but to release acting upon them is never wise. Wisdom is practicing replacing those with empathy and compassion.

Poor Sam (not her real name). She was so distraught. I reassured her that it was just farm life - it happens. I didn't blame her, I said - it really could have happened to anyone, including me (and by this time I utterly embraced the truth of this statement) and that she should chalk it up to experience. Chickens die - fact.

Her boyfriend must have interrupted them in time as three chickens came back, having fled the coop in fear, and four were injured - only a few deaths, that I could figure out. She took four to the vet, which cost the poor love $300. One was put down, and three are home with medication and hope they'll recover from their fright.

Oh, and the title 'all my pretty ones?'. It comes from the blood soaked Shakespeare play, Macbeth, where the titular character slaughters the lord Macduff's family - wife, children, all. His response is utter horror and inability to articulate his distress and trauma. It is designed to elicit sympathy for Macduff, and compassion and empathy - the audience imagines what it would be like to lose their entire family in such a blood bath, and the cruelty of Macbeth reaches it's pinnacle.

He has no children. All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
At one fell swoop?

Mind you, he does cut off MacBeth's head. 'He must feel it like a man', he says, before he acts like his version of a man - violently.

Sometimes murder is justified.

Now where are those damn foxes.