Triggers to Peace

Four way stops can bring out the best in us, or perhaps I should say the worst in us. You know what I mean. My family and I were going out to dinner the other night when we came to one of those threatening intersections. I thought for sure that I had stopped and waited my turn. But then as luck would have it, so did the other person. They started to do a quick turn in front of me, I guess to cut me off and to let me know I had not waited my turn. The driver gave me a mean look, and I looked back. I doubt if I had a smile on my face either. The other driver looked so angry and seemed quick to shake her fist at me as if I, in her mind, had just committed a capital offense. The driver behind her yelled at me too! I thought for sure that I had...well, maybe I had not. Maybe they were not watching and thought I came out of nowhere, without stopping of course. Maybe I didn't; I thought I did. Whatever the case, nobody crashed, nobody was hurt. And yet their anger was triggered to the point of shaking their fists at me like they were ready for a fight. I must admit, they must have triggered something in me too because I continued to talk with my son and wife about it for the next several minutes like these people deserved to be on a "Most Wanted" poster in the Post Office. They both assured me that I was in the right (but then that's what someone else wisely says when they want the other person to pay for dinner).

I wonder, what is it within us, within me, that triggers such anger to the point that we throw down the gauntlet as if we are ready for a fight because of the infringement or mistake of the other person? (Most of us hope that the other person will not accept our challenge to a fight, neither do we wait around to find out if they accepted the challenge). What do these triggers really get us except for some accelerated emotion and some indigestion (and family who wished we would get overe it faster than what we do)?

There was an interesting moment in a show I saw the other night. An assassin had just been caught after killing his target. Seeing himself surrounded he slowly lifts his gun up while FBI agents are yelling, "Don't do it!" And he lifts his gun further and points it at his head and again the agents yell, "Don't do it!" Who was going to shoot first? (What were they going to do, shoot him before he shot himself?)

I wonder what triggers us toward peace with the same passion and energy that we are triggered toward violence? Am I, are you, inclined to pull one trigger more than the other? What really will trigger us toward peace?"