The boat had probably come untied and drifted along in the breeze until it had bumped into the monk’s boat. It was just an empty boat! The monk found his anger dissipating, for there was no one to get angry at. At that moment, he remembered his mentor’s question: “Do you know what is really making you angry?” Now he knew he had his answer. “It’s not other people, situations, or circumstances. It’s not the empty boat but my reaction to it that causes my anger. All the people or situations that upset me are like the empty boat. Without my reaction, they don’t have the power to make me angry.”
