Chad Silverstein explains the difference between reacting, an emotional reflex when you're caught off guard, and responding, a deliberate choice based on your core beliefs. Having your principles pre-loaded gives you the mental space to act intentionally instead of being swept away by emotion.
Chapters
If you were going to define the difference between respond and react, what would you say? And it's a nuance and it's a big one. And the difference is, is that when someone is very emotional and someone gets caught off guard, someone gets hit with something that happens and triggers them, they tend to react to that. And most people live in this space where they're constantly reacting to life. They're reacting to someone at their job doing something they don't like, a client who calls up and gets upset. Someone at home who, who kind of loses their temper and then they react to that. So we're always in that kind of reaction mode. But someone with a really strong core, someone who knows who they are, they know what they believe, they know why they believe it, they know how they want to live because they're guided by a set of principles and they have core purposes that drive them and guide them in their life, they respond. And it's very different. And the difference between the reaction and the responding is that when you respond, you've already preloaded how you're going to react in a situation. You've already thought about, you know what you believe about someone quitting on you, someone screwing you over, you know, someone lying or cheating from you. You already know because you've thought about what you believe about that. You know what you believe. And because you're driven by this way of influencing yourself, because you're strong in who you are, you don't have to just react emotionally. You're able to kind of create some space, reflect, and then act. And that's the difference.
