For every minute you remain angry, you give up sixty seconds of peace of mind. –Ralph Waldo Emerson
This beautiful quote is from Ralph Waldo Emerson. My understanding from this is that if you are angry for one hour we will be losing our peace of mind for 3600 seconds and if we are angry for one day we will be losing our peace of mind for 86, 400 (1440 minutes) seconds in a day.
Imagine if you are angry for more than 2 days or for week(s) or for month(s) or for year(s) with someone or on anything how many seconds and minutes will be gone by not having that peace within us that we all crave for.
Anger is the most common emotion in human beings. Anger can trigger in us in any moment of the day regardless of time. This can take over our inner peace.
Let us analyze on one situation that might trigger angry in our day. Let us take an imaginary person called A. And an imaginary meter that reads our anger called angry Meter. This morning A’s level of anger is at zero degree. Suddenly A realizes that he is having a meeting today morning at 8:00 am and that his physical presence is needed at office.
And, he did not convey this to his partner/spouse the night before. He requests his partner/spouse to drop the kids in school for today. But the partner/spouse denies it. And, tells that as per the tight week schedule we cannot change this in the last moment.
Now the argument starts between A and the partner/spouse. The partner/spouse leaves the house angrily. A’s angry level has increased from zero to 20 degrees on angry Meter. However he drops the kids at school and leaves for the office. Still he is on schedule. However, he is trying to reach the office at least by 8:00 am.
Now, he meets with a minor accident. And it took more time than the anticipated time for the procedures to be finished. In between he has been receiving the calls from office and from his boss. Now no way A can reach the office on time. His anger meter reading is at 40 degrees.
He enters the office. Usually the boss is very understanding. But as today’s meeting was very very important to the boss and for the business. The boss is angry on A. One more argument goes between the boss and A for that day. Now his anger reading meter is at 60 degrees. His head is heated up and is fuming.
He sits at his desk. A’s teammate walks in and asks him if we could finish the yesterday’s task as other business units are asking for it. Now, A loses his control and raises the voice a little more than the normal at the co-worker or teammate. One more argument goes for the day between them.
Now, A’s anger meter is at 80 degrees. No more he cannot concentrate on the work neither he can fulfill the tasks.
He leaves for the day. He has cooled down a bit but not in total. His angry Meter reading is at 60 degrees. He does not talk much for that day. He sleeps. He wakes up next morning. His anger meter is at 40 degrees. That means though his anger levels are less then yesterday he is still infested with yesterday’s anger.
He is harvesting anger within him. Any small trigger can increase his anger Meter levels easily as his meter reading is at 40 degrees at that morning. By end of this day there might be high chances of increasing up to 80 or 100 degrees, if the same domino effect continues today as yesterday.
This is just one scenario. There can be many situations that might trigger anger and the anger meter to sour. Hence have peace. 🙂 The best practice I’ve observed is to keep a constant check on our anger levels. Tweak it as soon as it is more than the minimum levels. Accept there is anger in you.
We cannot avoid anger. However we can manage it. It is difficult to avoid angry totally. Sometimes it just creeps in. For this we need to know ourselves better and release anger that we are harvesting inside. I feel, always degree of anger should be less than the degree of peace or degree of peace should be more than the degree of anger.
As I observed, constant monitoring of ourselves is the mantra. Do not harvest anger. Let go off the small things. Let go off the anger inside. And let in the peace while you are releasing the anger. And imbibe the peace. Feel the peace inside. Empower yourself with the peace inside you.