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catspine
USA
239 Posts |
 Posted - 04/06/2010 : 20:06:02
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TMS forum posters often talk about expressing their anger-mostly the conscious one - in an attempt to eliminate their symptoms which may or may not work so I thought I would write about a different approach on the subject which was helpful in my own recovery.
You can work wonders when you need to but did you ever get up on the wrong side of bed? We don’t know why but when it happens it’s never really good for us.
Is this something that sounds familiar? As soon as your feet hit the ground the pressure starts building up and the objects or people nearby or even far away can already feel the heat, anything becomes an excuse for expressing anger and if there is no target well how difficult is it to create one? It may start like this :
Look at this dam rain! When is it going to stop? You catch a glance from someone taken by surprise by your attitude and you ask : What’s wrong with you what are you looking at ? Far away dogs are barking, why are these dogs barking out there?what do they want? and by the way where are my glasses somebody must have misplaced them? No need to say you’re sorry you just found them on top of your head 10 sec later , right?… And on and on so nobody dares to come nearby even the dog or the cat stay away as if they knew better than to pick it up even if you have a mean word for them while you’re at it and if they do it gets even worse. All of those are mostly questions w/o an obvious answer when it comes out of your mouth of course or else it would not serve the purpose to display power as efficiently.
But it feels good to rev up doesn’t it? And the feeling of power it brings along with it does feel good too. Although we commonly do it expressing it will not solve the problem which is to eliminate anger in the first place. And it will go on until it is consumed or repressed unless something unexpected happens to change that w/o the nasty consequences.
All of this may go on without you even being aware of it but anyone you’ll come across will perceive your anger through your tense bodily expression even if you don’t open your mouth , there are many way for others to feel the way we feel and when it comes to anger it works perfectly well doesn’t it? This part is important because it conditions what will come next . The tension in your body increases rapidly fed by the anger and the anger will not recede until the tension does.
Because you're expressing the way you feel your energy will be easily picked up by someone else’s sensors on alert and in turn it will feed your anger more fuel if the reaction is nothing else than what you expect quenching your thirst for an illusion of power by way of consequences while you display it or maybe you can turn off the anger to restore the balance if you let the magic happen:
Let say the day goes on like that with you bulldozing everything in your path but walking in the opposite direction appears the person of your dreams all happy to be alive and smiling at you...what happens to your anger and your display of power then?
This time let's hope your sensors will capture it... THAT’s ‘the magic part’ of course because you don’t want to spoil your chances and will very quickly readjust your behavior dropping your anger right there and then. It is magical because suddenly you also become aware of the consequences of what you’ve been doing since you got up because, remember ? You can work wonders when you need to and it’s your choice.
Now here are two different kinds of power on display: one is self serving, addictive, very unstable and needs anger to survive and the other one is dependable, pain and trouble free and can promote peace and health and remove even the biggest obstacles there are . On top of that it is easy to figure out the real benefits of it on the long run. Which one are you going to choose then?
So you may ask why it is so difficult to let go of anger?
Anger is an effect of tension and cannot take place if there is no tension present first. Think about it for a minute, tension is what got you there in the first place. Beside that anger serves a purpose in our psyche, it has for effect to make us feel like we have power when we display anger, that’s why we do it first when we are not yet challenged to lose what’s at stake in which case we can either repress it or DECIDE to switch to a more positive and rewarding display of an other facet of who we really are . A lot of thing happen to us because we are more passive than active so why not become active?
Don’t forget that when you display a behavior that is conducive to happiness and joy it affects the world around you just as much as you do with anger but the result doesn’t bear the same fruit so maybe letting the anger out is fine to begin with but it’s not enough to become tension free. An extra decision needs to be made as to what we want to project that will reflect on our well being .
Thanks for taking the time to read. |
Edited by - catspine on 04/06/2010 21:27:23 |
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LuvtoSew
USA
327 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2010 : 06:41:31
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Catspine, great post, very insighful.
If you want to know why we are all angry or frustrated
a good book is.
How Evil Works by David Kupelian, it has Christian overtone, but explains why people act like they do, alot about anger, etc, our society, goverment etc. you can read reviews on Amazon. |
Edited by - LuvtoSew on 04/08/2010 06:44:03 |
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catspine
USA
239 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2010 : 15:08:55
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LuvtoSew
Thanks for your reply and the reference to the book I'll check it out.
Lately as I'm reviewing the progress I made towards recovery just in case I'd need to use it again efficiently and a strange fact is regularly coming back to the surface in all the observations: I don't really know what to call it so I would say it is the sequence of cause and effects as we learn them but also as we use them to alter the symptoms and I discovered to my amazement that the order is a top conditions to recovery. Especially since it may go by unnoticed in the process maybe because we are too focused on the destination instead of on the journey to get there.
When elements like fear, tension, abuse, anger, repression, denial are the known ingredients leading to a condition and are all entangled in the funnel of the symptoms my question became how do I determine which is a cause and which is an effect and what is the method to sort them out in order to achieve healing? We know that these are responsible for the condition but in which order? I found the order very important because in my case it explains logically why I had such and such symptoms in a way that makes the most sense and once I knew that it was instrumental to eliminate the symptoms one by one.
A very simple example of that was anger and tension: For the longest time I thought and heard that anger creates tension (which it does)and tension becomes the symptom until I heard the opposite which I had never thought of as a possibility and it unlocked the mystery and I was able to get well because actually tension is always there first and therefore I had a choice about what was creating it so obviously I could act upon it.
Whereas in the previous case I would have to determine what the anger was about if I could and blame the tension on that which is not in my nature and fail to make it work for me because the order was wrong to begin with. It became clear that it was my first thoughts that were misleading and responsible for a built up of assumptions useless to my condition.
In the process I also became aware of that we rely way too much on the medical profession (probably because of our culture) to correct the mistakes we make and take care of what we should do for ourselves in the first place. In my case it turns out not having the means to get treated conventionally became a blessing.
Never underestimate the power of the universe and that it has good stuff in store for you even if it doesn't look like so at first.
I 'm talking about self help here because I live in a remote place on an island and have no access to specialized expensive help so I had to do with what there is and I found it as I patiently explored my options by a difficult lengthy process of elimination or with sporadic help from older local people well trained in their ancient healing traditions. Having access to this forum also made a difference which is why I'm posting here as a way to do my share.
By the way if she reads this I 'd like to thank Marsha for a comment she made about one of my posts which was really helpful,I mean the comment was. Thank you .
These personal experiments may sound basic to some in which case they will find no interest in this but it may help those who have some and it's good enough for me.
First let's put the socks on and then the shoes doesn't that make sense? |
Edited by - catspine on 04/09/2010 12:54:04 |
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charbald
11 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2010 : 23:12:16
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This makes a lot of sense to me. Helpful books for me has been "Taming the Tiger Within" and "Peace is Every Step" both by Thich Nhat Hanh. He is buddhist, however I think that his teachings can easily work for someone of other religious backgrounds.
In Taming the Tiger, he explains that anger is always within us. It helps us stand up for ourselves and is healthy. It is meant to bubble up to the surface of our psyche to alert us to potential problems. It's when this lightly bubbling anger (tension) is not recognized and dealt with that real ugly side of anger decides to show it's face.
I find that 'sitting with the anger' when I feel it is really helpful. By this I mean observing it from a distance, so to speak. Then really allowing yourself the right to experience it (quietly, not with an outburst). After this, my anger seems to have so much less of a grip on me. |
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catspine
USA
239 Posts |
Posted - 04/09/2010 : 13:39:37
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Yes thanks Charbald for mentioning that anger is always within us as a tool that is part of our defense mechanism and of course like any tool it can be too big or too small or inappropriate for the job if not chosen carefully.
Once again the important point here is having the choice in a decision we make ahead of time before the feeling of anger tends to blind us when it becomes overwhelming.
An other aspect I forgot to mention in this process is the degree of trust in oneself when making a choice and this one may be a tough one: lack of trust in oneself can sabotage even the best effort one can make...
When it becomes obvious that we have a choice where we previously though we didn't then we still have to overcome the doubts about the choice itself which will support the action as the foundation for it.
This is where our beliefs need to be clear and strong and it helps a lot to know oneself well. The stronger the faith in your beliefs the better offf you will be.
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On anger
