Why you Should Respond and not React
I read a little article last week which I loved and of course made me think 🙂
Basically, the short version is …….this woman in a coffee shop knocked over her cup of coffee, she exclaimed to her friend “oh no I’ve spilt my coffee”, the friend then said to her, no, you haven’t spilt your coffee, you have knocked over your cup and whatever you had in your cup has spilt out, it just happened to be coffee!
I just love that!
It made me think that many of us, especially those of us on the personal development journey, work so hard at making sure we Respond not React to stressful/unexpected/unwanted things that come our way.
We take a deep breath and Respond in a measured way, calmly and without conflict as opposed to flying off the handle, shouting, getting angry, making snide comments etc.
We try not to ‘sweat the small stuff’, not to let the little things that really don’t matter wind us up, we try to be patient with people, see things from their perspective, not be judgmental, no self pity and play the victim, not people please etc.
And sometimes we feel we are doing such a good job, we can even begin to feel a touch smug at just how enlightened we are becoming and how wonderfully we are handling things……..yet, that is all fine and good when everything is going great, but what happens when someone (or we) get knocked sideways, i.e. our cups get knocked over?
This is when you truly know how far you’ve come, because what is in your cup will come spilling out!
It is easy to feel the joy of life when it’s all going well, it is easier to RESPOND to others when our lives are great, it is easy not to sweat the small stuff when everything is going just exactly as we want – this is when we can think that inside of us, at our very core, are all those wonderful qualities we harp on about.
But, and it’s a big but, what comes spilling out of you when your cup is knocked over? Is it still that deep sense of happiness, contentment, freedom, goodwill to others or do you revert back to anger, frustration, even hatred, spite, jealousy……..?
You know I think that AWARENESS is your super power, so next time your cup is knocked over, notice, really notice what is spilling out….this is when it really counts 🙂
It happened to me this weekend, my cup was knocked and I was so surprised at what came out, old feelings and beliefs around money, independence and self worth that I thought were long gone, a timely reminder that self development is a life-long journey for each and every one of us – it’s fun too, getting to know all your little quirks (good and bad), so let’s keep on that journey 🙂
What came out of your cup this weekend?