你無法改變那些必然發生的事情，它們終會發生。你要做的就是期望它們發生，甚至在發生前就把它們看作已經發生的事實，那麼你就不會那麼惱怒了。
你不會表現過分。你會很合適的做出回應。你可以和當事人談談他們的行為，平心靜氣的請求他們考慮一下你的感受…你不會過於情緒化以至於把事情搞得更加複雜。
你會微笑，思考，「這是我所期望發生的。杯子早就摔碎了。我可以接受。」
你的內心會很安靜。我的朋友們，這是一個多麼受歡迎的小驚喜啊。
How many times have you gotten upset because someone wasn’t doing their job, because your child isn’t behaving, because your partner or friend isn’t living up to his or her end of the bargain?
How many times have you been irritated when someone doesn’t do things the way you’re used to? Or when you』ve planned something carefully and things didn’t go as you』d hoped?
This kind of anger and irritation happens to all of us — it’s part of the human experience.
One thing that irritates me is when people talk during a movie. Or cut me off in traffic. Or don’t wash their dishes after eating. Actually, I have a lot of these little annoyances — don’t we all?
And it isn’t always easy to find peace when you』ve become upset or irritated.
Let me let you in on a little secret to finding peace of mind: see the glass as already broken.
See, the cause of our stress, anger and irritation is that things don’t go the way we like, the way we expect them to. Think of how many times this has been true for you.
And so the solution is simple: expect things to go wrong, expect things to be different than we hoped or planned, expect the unexpected to happen. And accept it.
One quick example: on our recent trip to Japan, I told my kids to expect things to go wrong — they always do on a trip. I told them, 「See it as part of the adventure.」
And this worked like a charm. When we inevitably took the wrong train on a foreign-language subway system, or when it rained on the day we went to Disney Sea, or when we took three trains and walked 10 blocks only to find the National Children’s Castle closed on Mondays … they said, 「It’s part of the adventure!」 And it was all OK — we didn’t get too bothered.
So when the nice glass you bought inevitably falls and breaks, someday, you might get upset. But not if you see the glass as already broken, from the day you get it. You know it』ll break someday, so from the beginning, see it as already broken. Be a time-traveler, or someone with time-traveling vision, and see the future of this glass, from this moment until it inevitably breaks.
And when it breaks, you won’t be upset or sad — because it was already broken, from the day you got it. And you』ll realize that every moment you have with it is precious.