When I get angry, it's usually about past experiences that transpired, and on a deeper level, I completely understand why. I grasp, to the best of my ability, the differing perspectives. I become more frustrated with the ruminating thoughts because I know better, and it almost feels like a relapse in my growth efforts. I go even deeper to connect the frivolity to issues relating to global problems and generational traumas.
Anger can be comprised of unresolved passions that you confuse with your pain and slap an egoic label onto.
It's not the inability to let go, nor is it that I have more work to do, because I work, work, work, work, work. That was Rihanna. It could be the need to have new experiences to create new neural pathways, but that's a brain lesson for another day.
I reached out to a friend with the simplistic question:
Why do you think it is that we hold so much rage to certain people more than others? Ones who were doing what they thought was right amidst not knowing what to do with the hand they were dealt?
Point blank, her epic response:
Because we subconsciously expect them to realize their faults as we do ours, and it's frustrating because they aren't at the same level of self-awareness and consciousness.
This led to a mind-blowing comprehension of my expression of empathy. Everyone is on their path and will grow at their speed. For me, I have always felt a wave of anger, even from childhood. I always had the 'knowing' and awareness of things, and the injustices of the world, the deliberate actions of cruelty, even in my young mind, irked me beyond belief. The irony is that the anger often comes from wanting good for others. So maybe rage at its roots holds a greater purpose.
Others often didn't get what I was putting down. They made choices that were so blatantly hurtful that in my efforts to be non-judgemental, I became more supportive and more passive. This people-pleasing led me to forget how to express my rage and not feel ashamed for it. I shouldn't punch anyone in the throat. I've punched genitals before. Not sorry.
I do get frustrated at what to me, are pithy personal things to still be bothered by. It's the frustration of empowering the weakness and not focusing on the fortitude. It's the vapid exhibitions of cruelty, the unhealthy ego's expression of rage that irks me still. Because at its core, cruelty, on a grander scale, is harm to animals, the environment, and fellow humans, right? So in our projections onto one another, we fail to recognize our cruelties for what they are. Weak attempts at control.
In that reclamation of self, when you peel away the layers of shame you hold, you feel the anger toward others, but then it's the anger toward self. Because I stopped listening to and trusting myself fully, and in my niceness, and trying not to hurt others, I lost my edge, which is an equally valid part of me. Whether we determine it to be the more masculine side in its presentation, the sacredness of feminine rage, letting the emotionality rise, is crucial. I allow myself to process it healthily and end up on the other side with yet another lesson.
The rage I feel is ultimately not at the person but rather the lack of love shown in the scenario. That is also inclusive of the lack of love I was showing me. Residual anger is the forgiveness I need to give myself. All these pains in adulthood equate to childhood pains suppressed, hence the importance of healing the inner child. When I was younger, I would get these rage-filled moments over things I knew were foolish to be upset over. But I would scrunch my body up into a fireball because I didn't yet fully understand my heightened sensitivity and purposeful mandate.
It can be the fire that fuels you. It can drive you toward betterment if you let it out effectively.
From an energetic perspective, it's just all this energy locked inside of you that needs to come out. Some people channel it ineffectively, and it remains. Am I obsessed with The Body Keeps The Score by Dr. Bessel Van Der Kolk? Yes, and that book is applicable here.
Others channel it through healthier lifestyle choices and open and guilt-free communication. The latter is the less popular option because I suppose it's harder.
When we view it this way, we fear less the release of it, and we turn the projections that are painful into constructive initiatives of growth and connectivity. Maybe, the pithy things that irk you still are merely putting a face to the larger issues at hand, and in your macro-sized existence, you can uncover the meaning behind these thoughts and feelings and challenge them to teach you more about yourself and human connection.