I recently came across a speech by Sundar Pichai, Global Head Google Chrome. He had spoken about the difference between reaction and response to a given situation. In this context, he spoke about a cockroach theory. He exemplified it by narrating an incident in a restaurant that he had witnessed himself. It related to reaction & response of some of the guests, in dealing with the menace suddenly created by a cockroach that came to bother them from nowhere. Most of them panicked while an intelligent waiter thought of a way to drive it out.
According to Mr. Pichai, reactions are always instinctive whereas responses are always well thought of and if we respond to situations in an easy, serene, sensible manner, it would make our lives much easier.
I really feel that what he said was quite true in our daily life. Consider some of the following everyday situations.
A child comes back slightly hurt and the mother gets panicky. She reacts to the situation with a whole lot of queries, getting into an investigative mode, rather than taking care of the child & his wounds. If only she stays cool & responds to the situation in a composed manner, the outcome would be entirely different.
There can be umpteen situations like these, some examples are like a child spilling milk on the bed / floor, a mother getting back tired from a day's hard work and seeing the mess at home or even traffic jams or a rude response from our boss, where we are prone to react rather than respond. All this exhibits our inability to handle situations caused by the disturbances at home or at work. Thus more than the problem it's our reaction to the problem that creates chaos in our life.
Hence, we should learn to manage every emerging situation by practicing the art of "pausing to think awhile" before attempting to do anything. This will involve responding rather than reacting. In fact, all our troubles are due to the fact that we rarely think of the likely consequences of our actions. Therefore, it becomes imperative in everybody's interest to just pause (stop) and think (of the pros & cons) before responding to people & situations. Surely, this will be qualitatively better & more civilized way of living.