We all have heard this — keep calm, respond not react. There is a popular story illustrating this — A cockroach flies in and lands on a lady seated in a restaurant and how she shrieks in fear, while when it lands on the waiter the waiter calmly observes the cockroach and then takes him out. While one is tempted to blame the cockroach for the commotion, it is actually the inability/ability to handle the situation that leads to an outcome.
So Reaction is prompted by inability to handle a situation. Response is prompted when you can handle the situation. Reaction leads to anxiety, depression, irritation, anger and all other negative emotions that sucks your energy. While response on the other hand preserves your energy and can even increase it as you feel calm, motivated, happy and experience a whole lot of positive emotions.
As I observe or contemplate on where I have been, I realize that I have more often been in the reaction space. As I follow my spiritual path practicing Nichiren Buddhism, I have been able to work on this and increase the times I am in the responding space. What really helped me is the example given by Sensei Toda in the book “Happiness begins at Home”. Sensei Toda when he was addressing people gathered at a meeting thumped hard on the table causing 2 glasses on the table to bump into each other and break. At this point Sensei Toda mentions that the glasses had the tendency to break so they broke. Had it been a glass and cotton, neither would have been broken/destroyed. He then inspires us to be the cotton.
Ever since then I have been observing the tendency — for example if I spilt something, I know that because it is liquid in an open container it has the tendency to spill so why get irritated or frustrated.
It’s monsoon season now in Mumbai, so yes it will rain, the roads will be wet, water will collect on the road, vehicles will pass by and water will splash and land on the nearest objects/people. I used to get angry earlier if the water was splashed onto me by a passing vehicle, especially if I had no option to avoid. Yesterday however I was calm as I realized that the water would splash and it had no other choice but to land on me as I stood in its path of landing! I enjoyed a few more moments of peace in my life.
Faith goes a long way too. What is faith? Faith is believing and knowing that everything will just work out fine, so keep calm and observe and see what needs to be done rather than reacting.
I’m building my spiritual muscle as I practice Nichiren Buddhism based on the 3 pillars of Faith-Practice-Study. I am grateful for the opportunity to do my Human Revolution to keep working towards a better version of me under the guidance of my mentor Dr Daisaku Ikeda.
