Anger
is something I struggle with at a deep level.
People through my life who have been mean to me, betrayed my trust or abondoned me with no rational reason (these are possibly inherently irrational actions) have hurt me, and when I think about the negative past experiences in my life, some people make me angry.
But the anger feels deeper still... perhaps a mixture of experience as an infant that have left a permanent impression in my brain & past karma I have yet to fully let go of, learn and grow from..
Expressions of anger can "stir things up" but never seems to cause change, unless it is by physical force, and that kind of force, even if it has an immediately positive effect for some, sets an example of unintelligent barbarism that does not help ultimately, I feel.
As Neem Karoli Baba once asked Ram Dass, "Can't you see it's all perfect?".
All of the lost souls who have hurt us and others we love, all of the immature, unconscious, irresponsible Humans who cause problems and then put the blame on the ones they hurt or some other convenient scapegoat, all of the selfish people, who hurt the ones they love even more than strangers, but never try to change...
They are all perfect in their imperfection. If a crocodile eats a cute baby animal, is it cruel?
Anger is a natural Human emotion in many situations, but how we respond to it is the key.
Acting on anger and feeling anger are different things, but if we feel angry for more than a few minutes, we will certainly act on it in some way, even if it's unintentional like "road rage" or blowing up on someone who doesn't have anything to do with the reason I'm angry.
My anger is deep. A crocodile ate my baby rabbit. The world does not "seem fair", and the crocodile never apologized or turned itself into the police.
Should I stay angry? Does it serve me?
Some people who were abused as children become political activists. They channel this endless stream of anger into some cause they also believe in, for years or half a lifetime before realizing the true source of their rage.
I was never that angry, and maybe I wasn't "that abused" as a child, but I was abused, and it has made me prone to anger.
What I did, is I tried to "fix" the abuser. I tried to help my Dad, whose broken mind cause me, him and all of our family much suffering until he passed away when I was 21. Of course, I couldn't fix him.
Then I started attracting friends and romantic partners with similar dysfunctional mental-emotional traits to my father, always trying to fix them, help them be more sane, more happy, more productive... always mostly failing and worse, being abused by them as their natural response to my attempt to help. Can you be mad at a crocodile for biting?
Once they bite, I feel hurt, then I get angry, which just perpetuates a cycle of negativity.
The anger, from my perspective, is where things end after a long chain of errors. To act on the anger will just create more problems, like fighting against quicksand.
So, to all you crocodiles who bite, I love you, and I hope you realize you don't need to bite so much, but I accept that that's what you are prone to do if I get too close to you, so I will love you and respect you from a distance. No point to me being angry at who you are at this point in your life. I'd just rather live my life with all my limbs.
Everytime I've bitten any creature with my words out of anger, I felt disappointed in myself, sooner or later. Angry interactions do not serve me or others, and I want to honor this Life with choices and words that come from a place of Love, not Anger. And to the people who believe anger is useful and justified, I love you too and wish you well
Well it was nice to have u back with us 'kingfisher'. How can we for get your thoughtful posts and threads?
One of the key and essential parts of avoiding anger is to get away from such people as soon as you recognize they are abusive. As adults this is possible. There are many people out there who are healthy human beings who want to be kind to you.
