Estimated reading time: 9 minutes
So, you start by reading the message … twice.
The first time, the message will tell you what it says, while the second will tell you the … insult behind it.
By the time you reach the third, your body has joined the argument 😊. Your jaw tightens, your attention narrows like a horse with blinders and you begin composing a reply designed for one purpose only: to make the other person feel what you are feeling.
How many times, haven’t we done this? But, what we do not understand is that this is a dangerous interval in anger: although the event has already occurred, your response has not.
Of course, most damage is done here. We send the message, we make the accusation, raise our voice and involve an audience (e.g. friends) or decide that just this one act has revealed the whole character of another person. Remember, our focus has narrowed … laser beam narrow.
And later on, when the anger recedes, we may still believe that something wrong occurred. But, most of the times – assuming we have a spark of conscience within us, we will regret that we let our anger chose the timing, language and scale of our response.
Going back in time and to Marcus Aurelius. Marcus gives himself ten reminders in Meditations 11.18, not three. The diagnostic below is therefore a modern reconstruction: a practical compression of a sequence that appears repeatedly in his notes.
