Anger and Anger issues
I chose to honor my emotions. It has been my path to see how I feel, analyse it and accept it. When I am angry, I am angry, when I am furious, I am furious, when I am in love I am in love. I have come to accept that that is NOT what most people do.
I Have issues with the way society - or in my case to two societies that I am living in - are handling emotions. I disagree with a lot of the publicly endorsed judgement calls. Like:
your husband cheats on you: you GOT to leave him (btw mine isn't, that is not the issue)
it is not ok or somehow demeaning to chose to stay a family for the kids (usually said by peeps who either don't have kids or are already divorced)
etc.
I think we have a lot of emotions in our bags. And I think we do the tool kit we have been given a great disservice by the way we have been handling it. I see quite a number of human being around me, male and female, who have absolutely no handle on their emotions. Which in turn means that emotions have a huge handle on them and they often feel out of control of their lifes. that , often, leads to insecurity and is often turned into a lashing out at the world in general.
I tend to be one of the people which act like a magnet for these free flowing negative emotions. People and YES I do mean random people, not just people I chose to be near. People like the person parking next to me, like the doctor in the hospital, like the cashier or the waitress attack me.
And here's the kicker. they don't do it for a reason that I can discern. And believe me I tried. I nearly drove myself insane by listening to everybody in their second cousin's advise on how *I* need to change. Since -allegedly - only I have a problem with this, there must be something wrong with me. So I tried: I tried being less decisive, I tried being less open, I tried speaking softly, I tried to never interupt anybody. Some of you will laugh. because in your opinion I never did that. but then very few of you knew me all my life and I have been struggling with this all my life.
I don't believe any emotion to be superior or infirior to another, I think.
Partly writing this down is making sure I understand things and sharing it is to solicit input. I am given the impression that people think there is a basic, a fundamental hirarchie to emotions and I wonder if that is REALLY true, or just some emotional illusion that is considered correct in this day and age and that I don't understand.
1. love is the 'best' emotion.
I don't fundamentally disagree with this. Love tempers everything. Love, if given unconditionally is fundamentally good. Or is it? I have always loved my man with no reservation. I never was one of the 'if he only was different' or 'I am sure I can change him'
I had always hoped that me being there for him - unconditionally - would help him heal. But it didn't. It enabled him. He turned into somebody I don't even know anymore. Because my love cannot heal. It can only offer, never take by force, never control, never interfere without just cause. And now my marriage is in deep deep trouble and I have been there for a while already. maybe it is because we are wrong for each otehr, or maybe because anything given freely is not valued much...I don't know.
2. sexual/romantic love is the basis of a marriage the force that drives us and justifies nearly everything.
now here I do fundamentally disagree.
In my view respect, loyalty, care and similar values are the basis of a marriage. sexual love is the basis of a sexual relationship but a marriage is so much more. It is shutting up even though you need to speak out when you realize that it would be hurtful. It is postponing the argument because your parents in law have made that turkey just for you guys, It is saying something only because you know that is what the other needs to hear. It is keeping yourself honest without making that the other's business/responsiblity. It is trying to keep each other whole and walking together. side by side as individuals on the same path. comfortable, but not without challenge. While I do enjoy good sex as much as the next girl, I also think it is vastly overrated. Bad sex, however, cannot be overrated too much, sigh.
3. anger is bad, harmonie is good
Today, especially in a woman but also in a man, anger is to be avoided at all cost. Which means that we have virtually no handle on how to deal with it. Anger is a complex emotion with all kinds of effects on our abilities. It should be handled with the expertise of a bomb squad, yet all we hand our children are crowbars and a lot of movement inhibiting armor called denial and 'calm down'.
Anger is not a bad thing. It is a natural thing. It is - for some -the build-in racing gear in the stickshift that makes up our personality and drives our lifes. It comes with an entire subset of gears too:
irritation = notification by your subconsicous that something weird is going on, which could possibly affect you in a negative way
frustration= notification by your subconsicous that the current situation is not good for you and should be ended soon, preferrably in a manner better than currently anticipated.
anger= notification that something is seriously threatening or just plain wrong. that there is a situation that needs attention. lots of it. and that you need to DO SOMETHING preferrably NOW.
fury= notification that the camel is looking up and seeing that last straw, so MOVE NOW. notification that you subconsicous is convinced on some level that there is an exixtential threat to something very very dear to you.
and these are only the gears that I am familiar with and I am not by nature an ANGRY person.(even if I have become more angry with the years but mostly my reaction to bad things is sadness and hurt)
Now: the actual issue a lot people are having is, that they only have one or two reactions to anger. Because the more intense your anger becomes the more difficult intricate thinking processes become THAT is a bad thing. Because people are trained to ignore anger as long as possible, they take as much as possible and then the tiniest irritaion makes them blow up like a granate or a nuke depending on the level of accumulated frustration and your personal temper. AND THEN people tell you you have anger management issues.
And you have. Just not in the way peeps think. Your issue is, because you didn't honor your irritaion, you don't know where it came from and thus cannot truly dismiss it as insignificant. It adds up as a feeling of being treated unfairly, and because the gears are really nothing more than a level of frustation, a certain amount of irritation will turn into frustration, a certain amount of frustration turns into anger and a certain amount of anger turns into fury.
So, it is natural for a certain amount of irrition to equal fury, however, irritation was never MEANT to be turned into fury. It was meant to be dealt with and then dismissed and moved on.but since our reaction to this emotion seems to have been turned into shut up and or fight. and fighting is clearly not called for by irritation the only thing left seems to be to shut up until you can do so no more. and then the person next to you has NO chance to see what hit her. In bad situations quite literally, but there are blows and then there are blows.
Now, with a passive agressive person, nobody but you sees the blows. With a smart passive agressive person, he/she will deny that a blow ever happend. if you proved beyond tha chance of denial that the blow actually occurs he/she will deny that this was his/her intention. You are caught in a never ending spiral of having to justify your own emotions, self doubt and the inevitable numbness that comes with time which leads your partner to opt up teh pressure to get you to react properly. which leads to......among other things isolation. Because in the 'public' eye, I am the unreasonable one. I am the demanding one, I control him. Because that is what they see. I have finally reached my fury level. though currently I am going through the numbness which is part of a grieving process, for having been so trusting. but I screamed. I hit him. and it felt like nothing but letting off the tiniest of steam of that agression that has built of ther course of so many years.because I am threatened to my very core.
Like the spouse of an beater or a drinker, you never know when it will hit you. you will always think it is somehow your fault it will make you feel miserable and will make the other miserable. and it is tough to see, tough to deal with and there are not a lot of good books out there, though there are some.
but of course it is my fault for BEING AN ENABLER.
BUt my husband is not my responsibility.His emotional growth is his responsibility. I may want to help him, but he has to choose a way to go. and frankly currently I am past the wanting to help him. currnetly I am just so freakin tired. I will try to write about shame, guilt and jealousy tomorrow but this is it for today
I Have issues with the way society - or in my case to two societies that I am living in - are handling emotions. I disagree with a lot of the publicly endorsed judgement calls. Like:
your husband cheats on you: you GOT to leave him (btw mine isn't, that is not the issue)
it is not ok or somehow demeaning to chose to stay a family for the kids (usually said by peeps who either don't have kids or are already divorced)
etc.
I think we have a lot of emotions in our bags. And I think we do the tool kit we have been given a great disservice by the way we have been handling it. I see quite a number of human being around me, male and female, who have absolutely no handle on their emotions. Which in turn means that emotions have a huge handle on them and they often feel out of control of their lifes. that , often, leads to insecurity and is often turned into a lashing out at the world in general.
I tend to be one of the people which act like a magnet for these free flowing negative emotions. People and YES I do mean random people, not just people I chose to be near. People like the person parking next to me, like the doctor in the hospital, like the cashier or the waitress attack me.
And here's the kicker. they don't do it for a reason that I can discern. And believe me I tried. I nearly drove myself insane by listening to everybody in their second cousin's advise on how *I* need to change. Since -allegedly - only I have a problem with this, there must be something wrong with me. So I tried: I tried being less decisive, I tried being less open, I tried speaking softly, I tried to never interupt anybody. Some of you will laugh. because in your opinion I never did that. but then very few of you knew me all my life and I have been struggling with this all my life.
I don't believe any emotion to be superior or infirior to another, I think.
Partly writing this down is making sure I understand things and sharing it is to solicit input. I am given the impression that people think there is a basic, a fundamental hirarchie to emotions and I wonder if that is REALLY true, or just some emotional illusion that is considered correct in this day and age and that I don't understand.
1. love is the 'best' emotion.
I don't fundamentally disagree with this. Love tempers everything. Love, if given unconditionally is fundamentally good. Or is it? I have always loved my man with no reservation. I never was one of the 'if he only was different' or 'I am sure I can change him'
I had always hoped that me being there for him - unconditionally - would help him heal. But it didn't. It enabled him. He turned into somebody I don't even know anymore. Because my love cannot heal. It can only offer, never take by force, never control, never interfere without just cause. And now my marriage is in deep deep trouble and I have been there for a while already. maybe it is because we are wrong for each otehr, or maybe because anything given freely is not valued much...I don't know.
2. sexual/romantic love is the basis of a marriage the force that drives us and justifies nearly everything.
now here I do fundamentally disagree.
In my view respect, loyalty, care and similar values are the basis of a marriage. sexual love is the basis of a sexual relationship but a marriage is so much more. It is shutting up even though you need to speak out when you realize that it would be hurtful. It is postponing the argument because your parents in law have made that turkey just for you guys, It is saying something only because you know that is what the other needs to hear. It is keeping yourself honest without making that the other's business/responsiblity. It is trying to keep each other whole and walking together. side by side as individuals on the same path. comfortable, but not without challenge. While I do enjoy good sex as much as the next girl, I also think it is vastly overrated. Bad sex, however, cannot be overrated too much, sigh.
3. anger is bad, harmonie is good
Today, especially in a woman but also in a man, anger is to be avoided at all cost. Which means that we have virtually no handle on how to deal with it. Anger is a complex emotion with all kinds of effects on our abilities. It should be handled with the expertise of a bomb squad, yet all we hand our children are crowbars and a lot of movement inhibiting armor called denial and 'calm down'.
Anger is not a bad thing. It is a natural thing. It is - for some -the build-in racing gear in the stickshift that makes up our personality and drives our lifes. It comes with an entire subset of gears too:
irritation = notification by your subconsicous that something weird is going on, which could possibly affect you in a negative way
frustration= notification by your subconsicous that the current situation is not good for you and should be ended soon, preferrably in a manner better than currently anticipated.
anger= notification that something is seriously threatening or just plain wrong. that there is a situation that needs attention. lots of it. and that you need to DO SOMETHING preferrably NOW.
fury= notification that the camel is looking up and seeing that last straw, so MOVE NOW. notification that you subconsicous is convinced on some level that there is an exixtential threat to something very very dear to you.
and these are only the gears that I am familiar with and I am not by nature an ANGRY person.(even if I have become more angry with the years but mostly my reaction to bad things is sadness and hurt)
Now: the actual issue a lot people are having is, that they only have one or two reactions to anger. Because the more intense your anger becomes the more difficult intricate thinking processes become THAT is a bad thing. Because people are trained to ignore anger as long as possible, they take as much as possible and then the tiniest irritaion makes them blow up like a granate or a nuke depending on the level of accumulated frustration and your personal temper. AND THEN people tell you you have anger management issues.
And you have. Just not in the way peeps think. Your issue is, because you didn't honor your irritaion, you don't know where it came from and thus cannot truly dismiss it as insignificant. It adds up as a feeling of being treated unfairly, and because the gears are really nothing more than a level of frustation, a certain amount of irritation will turn into frustration, a certain amount of frustration turns into anger and a certain amount of anger turns into fury.
So, it is natural for a certain amount of irrition to equal fury, however, irritation was never MEANT to be turned into fury. It was meant to be dealt with and then dismissed and moved on.but since our reaction to this emotion seems to have been turned into shut up and or fight. and fighting is clearly not called for by irritation the only thing left seems to be to shut up until you can do so no more. and then the person next to you has NO chance to see what hit her. In bad situations quite literally, but there are blows and then there are blows.
Now, with a passive agressive person, nobody but you sees the blows. With a smart passive agressive person, he/she will deny that a blow ever happend. if you proved beyond tha chance of denial that the blow actually occurs he/she will deny that this was his/her intention. You are caught in a never ending spiral of having to justify your own emotions, self doubt and the inevitable numbness that comes with time which leads your partner to opt up teh pressure to get you to react properly. which leads to......among other things isolation. Because in the 'public' eye, I am the unreasonable one. I am the demanding one, I control him. Because that is what they see. I have finally reached my fury level. though currently I am going through the numbness which is part of a grieving process, for having been so trusting. but I screamed. I hit him. and it felt like nothing but letting off the tiniest of steam of that agression that has built of ther course of so many years.because I am threatened to my very core.
Like the spouse of an beater or a drinker, you never know when it will hit you. you will always think it is somehow your fault it will make you feel miserable and will make the other miserable. and it is tough to see, tough to deal with and there are not a lot of good books out there, though there are some.
but of course it is my fault for BEING AN ENABLER.
BUt my husband is not my responsibility.His emotional growth is his responsibility. I may want to help him, but he has to choose a way to go. and frankly currently I am past the wanting to help him. currnetly I am just so freakin tired. I will try to write about shame, guilt and jealousy tomorrow but this is it for today