September 21, 2005

• Lifelessons

  
  

  I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that one of my central lifelessons in this particular iteration of existence concerns anger.

  
  

  I am not entirely sure when I realized this. “On paper,” it was a long time ago– but you know how there’s a difference between “knowing” something, and really Knowing it, in the core of your essence?

  
  

  I have had a couple of major “turning points” in my lifelessons about anger– one came some 10-12 years ago, in the dual context of being in therapy, and learning about the Enneagram. The second came maybe just a couple of years ago, the point at which I started Knowing anger– not only others’ but my own.

  
  

  Whereas my life have been filled with all sorts of people of different psychological predispositions, Angry Persons seem to have been a very prominent part of my life. Maybe it’s because their rage scares me, and that fear makes me less forward about telling them “sorry, you can take your whole trip somewhere else,” than people in general. As such, the angry environment ends up hanging around me like an oily fog that just won’t lift.

  
  

  Although I never knew him as an adult, it’s a fair bet that my dad was a “rage-aholic.” He was my “model” for what anger looked like, and his fiery short temper wasn’t something I wanted to be around. As an empathic and sensitive young-un, I was very aware of the fact that my dad’s reactive rage served as a major contributing factor in isolating him from other people. I remember hearing my mother talk about people who weren’t willing to come to our house, when my dad was home. I think my dad thought he was respected, but what I sensed in the people who dealt with him was mostly a mix of fear and pity.

  
  

  When I left home, at 18, all I could see were the “bad” sides of anger. And I knew that I didn’t want to be like him, so I was determined to not be angry. Ever. Fortunately, I was given a natural genetic makeup that included a very “long fuse.” However, all humans get into situations where they feel angry, and anger is the natural and appropriate response. Anger serves as an alert that there’s a difference between how things are, and how we want them to be. However, my repulsion with my father’s behavior was so strong that no matter what happened, I always stayed even-tempered; always took an “it’s not that important, it doesn’t matter” attitude.

  
  

  However, the Universe recognized that I hadn’t learned my lessons yet, and proceeded to present me with a parade of angry people. Of course, that’s probably patent nonsense, from a statistical standpoint. However, what I have experienced as True, is that the calm and gentle people I have met have never stayed around very long, while the handful of angry people make up most of the longest-term friendships/connections/relationships I have had. Clearly, there must be some lifelessons here. And, as I am prone to thinking, it is I– and not them– who is the “common denominator.”

  
  

  If the first lesson on anger was witnessing my dad’s destructiveness, and recognizing that I wanted something else, the second lesson came a dozen-odd years ago when I found myself in therapy, in deep personal despair, and in a marriage that was in deep trouble. For not the first time in my life, a therapist/mentor type person called bullshit on me when I claimed to not be angry.

  
  

  By then, I was early 30′s, and had a long battery of “reasons” why anger was not relevant to me. Some were quite creative, some were not:

  
  

  “People are different. Doesn’t it make sense that just like there are people given to explosive tempers, there must be people at the opposite end of the scale? I just have a very long fuse.”

  
  

  That one silenced most critics, but I had others:

  
  

  “My dad was always angry, and it scared people, and it goes against my core values to engage in behavior that scares people.”

  
  

  “It’s not that I have a problem with anger, it’s that I have problem with people exploding in rage before they think about what’s really going on.”

  
  

  Some were nebulous and unfathomable:

  
  

  “Anger is fine; there just has to be a good reason to get angry. I’d get angry over something important.”

  
  

  Of course, there was never anything “important” enough to take me beyond a basic– “that’s life, shit happens.” I even cited cultural issues (backed up by others):

  
  

  “Danish people are less predisposed to anger than Americans, because they come from a non-competitive, highly egalitarian society where a lot of the inequalities at the root of anger simply don’t exist.”

  
  

  Life has its ironic moments. Of all my “excuses,” that last one actually has the most meat on its bones. I’ve had several American friends remark on how they’ll spend a couple of weeks vacationing in Denmark, and then find themselves at JFK, O’Hare or LAX and find themselves actively struck by the raised voices and the angry expressions on people’s faces. But that’s a whole other story. 

  
  

  The “turning point” I experienced in my relationship with anger came when my counselor showed me that anger didn’t have to “look like” my dad. He just had one way of showing anger– an explosive/reactive way. This insight came hand in hand with the understanding that whereas I thought I had “escaped” from my dad, I had still managed to “marry anger.” Except this was a scheming/manipulative inward anger. But because it was “quiet” and didn’t feel outwardly dangerous, I didn’t recognize it as anger. And so (I believed), I had no reason to feel anger of my own– no matter how “bad” I felt. The Universe evidently had sent my lesson “in disguise.”

  
  

  At about the same time, I read a book about something called the Enneagram. Superficially speaking, it’s a personality typing system, much like Myers-Briggs, the Color Code, Ansir, Socionics, and others. However, on a deeper level, it’s a personal growth system which identifies the core issues different people face– and which tend to act as blockages to growth. I learned that I was a “type Nine,” and the core issues for Nines are all about the loss of self and being blind to one’s own anger.

  
  

  Of course, learning these things didn’t suddenly make me comfortable with anger. And so, the Universe kept me on my toes by sending more people with anger issues to feature prominently in my life. People who challenged me– through their rage– to look within and “know” all the anger I had hidden, over all those many years. As one of my Teachers once pointed out, the core of our unhappiness and suffering lies in our unexperienced emotions. For some people, that may be despair, or shame, or fear. A person might experience anger very readily, but can’t look at their fear. My “blind spot” was anger.

  
  

  When I finally accepted that I do feel anger, I was amazed at just how much of it was directed at myself. There was a great pool of rage at myself, for all the times I had made choices for the sake of “keeping the peace.” For the sake of “not making people angry.” And then came the realization that much of my life had been shaped by forceful pushy people– the very people I the least wanted around, but also the very people who the most required someone to “push against them.” And because the were the people– because of their forceful angry ways– I was most afraid to push against, I ended up not pushing. Essentially, a legacy of “selling out” my own dreams, hopes and ambitions, in the name of avoiding situations that might give rise to anger– my own, or other people’s.

  
  

  Whereas I have made peace with anger, I have no desire to be surrounded by it. I recognbize and accept that people get angry, but there are some people whose anger is genuinely destructive and unhealthy. I have little use for Angry People and Rage-aholics. I haven’t been very good at recognizing them, since they often “introduce” themselves as charming and dynamic. And I have been fooled by that, many times. But I have gotten better at recognizing some of the warning signs. The angry people I have known have had difficulty holding onto genuine friendships for any period of time, gravitating more towards “one-way” relationships with people who can be controlled. They often have had difficulties holding onto jobs, and tend to blame outside factors for those problems. They have had rather ascerbic communication styles, tending towards sarcasm, even when “quiet.” Their responses to adverse events have seemed quite disproportionate to the severity of the situation at hand. Lots of screaming at TVs, and computers and appliances. A tendency not to take responsibility for their own actions, instead resorting to blaming– and often projecting their own issues onto those closest to them.

  
  

  I suppose the third lesson, of a couple of years ago, is that we all have choice. It’s one thing to be unhealthily out of touch with one’s anger– there are lifelessons to be learned there. But just because we learn to experience and accept anger, doesn’t mean that we can’t exercise the choice to stay away from Angry People. Not wanting to have angry people in our lives doesn’t mean that we’re “blind” to anger– it means we’re exercising a choice as to what energies we invite to be part of our experience.

  
  

  How is your relationship with anger, and how have you interacted with the enraged people who have crossed your path? Do you wish you had acted differently?

  
  

   

  • 9:55 pm
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