releasing chronic anger and underlying grief

Anger serves a purpose as a defense against immediate threats in present time. The emotion is often produced in conjunction with fear. Fear is experienced and is often followed directly by an acting-out anger response. Boys and men are more accustomed to this way of behaving because it is condoned and often encouraged by the fabric of society — namely patriarchal norms.

[Aside: another form of anger is one that may come from seeing injustices and using the impetus of anger — expressed effectively — without acting it out to start on the path of correcting the injustice.]

The way many children were raised in the 1950s and early sixties by fathers’ who had returned from WWII with undiagnosed PTSD was through a reign of terror often accompanied by addictive problems to alcohol, drugs and anger/rage. The children of those parents were subjected to constant anger and as adults have often adopted maladaptive patterns of chronic anger. These habits of anger often become normalized and are no longer experienced as anger.

When terror is unleashed on a woman or on children repeatedly over long periods of time — fear, anger and depression may be the result. In addition to an emotional stance in the world many of these women and children many somaticize some or all of these emotions. The emotions become tensions in the musculature, skeletal structure of the body as a defensive posture — for example and are sequestered from the conscious mind.

The nature of most humans is to avoid discomfort whether it manifests as physical, emotional, mental and/or spiritual pain. In so-called developing and developed nations an immediate response to pain is to take a pill for it. “Make it go away.” “Fix me.” “Stop this now!” “I can’t stand this any longer” are some of the responses to physical and emotional pain or discomfort. Pill popping, alcohol consumption, marijuana smoking, crack/cocaine use, and any other kinds of addictive processes are efforts to escape the effects of immediate pain. I am not advocating the non-use of responsible herbal or pharmacological methods of reducing or managing extremes of pain I am only pointing out a pattern to behavior regarding pain.

Some cultures especially indigenous peoples treat pain in a different manner than in the “Western Post-Modern” cultures. Explorations into pain can sometimes produce a release of it that can be freeing as well as act as a release from immediate pain.

I followed the role-model of my father’s rageful behavior while being terrorized by it simultaneously. I vented rage at my sisters’ cats by chasing them under the couch and hissing at them; I felt so angry. It was the only safe place I could vent the rage I felt. For many years I clenched my jaw because “I felt determined” as other people were to reach their goals. I incorrectly assumed that because other people had their mouths closed that they were clenching their jaws too, and were also determined. It wasn’t until the mid 1980s that I realized that these were incorrect assumptions and that I felt extremely angry all the time.

Like any addict the rage would go underground until it erupted into a tantrum usually against a significant love relationship with whoever I was with at the time. I began to work with these feelings and worked to let them go as they arose. As I worked traumas from my childhood were revealed to me. I worked through these too as best I could until I reached a plateau.

Recently I have come to see that triggered anger/rage that arises both from awareness of injustices and from chronic anger has served to keep me isolated from others. As a child I was extremely isolated. And now I have been isolated (and stuck) in part by choice. However, I have started to work with the chronic anger anchored in my body in order to uncover and release the profound grief of past traumas.

I have been preparing for this voyage into the release where I have kept myself separate from others and as a result have been stuck in a place of miserable safety. A suggestion from a close friend helped me to recognize and participate in an opportunity to clear wounds from the past.

Part of the preparation for this deep grief release work was a letting go of a reflexive need to comment on every post where my friends were venting their anger and frustrations on our so-called “president” (current USA president). I didn’t want to participate in my addictive anger /rage venting that felt fruitless to make any real changes. The eliciting of the anger/frustration/rage and grief due to the actions of the president felt like I was allowing myself to be:

• Pulled down to his level of nastiness
• Giving him attention on an emotional level that feels like time not well spent (even though he is not witness to my outrage).
• Feeding my addictive behaviors including a need to be right at the expense of making others wrong
• Isolating myself from those that — mildly disagree with me to the extreme of people who vehemently disagree and maybe even hate me.
• Isolating myself from feelings that bridge a gap between peoples
• Stuck in a familiar cycle of known misery.

Choosing not to participate in “president” bashing is one way to look for more effect means of protest and there are many ways in the nuts and bolts world of emails to representatives, supporting candidate campaigns and so on… I try to funnel my outrage into useful means of action, and I am human I sometimes succumb to bashing and raging.

On Saturday evening November 16, 2019 while working on releasing anger and grief something happened. Through a healing metaphor I welcomed the memory of a physically healthy emotionally fractured seven-year-old me back into my body where I could protect him and he could help me heal. There was much tenderness, love and connectedness in the healing metaphor. I felt my body open spontaneously and released compassion towards a friend on social media and then go beyond towards others in pain and suffering. Love was breathed in and out.

I didn’t know whether my friend received the compassion but to release it felt good to me and hopefully good for him. And I hoped it was good for all the others it may have reached. The connection was strong and solid. The act of connecting on many positive levels was wondrous and highly recommended.