Anger – 1
This post is the first in a series on anger: Anger that works and strengthens a person; and, that which renders one immobile. Anger seems pervasive. We are affected by it daily whether we ourselves are experiencing and expressing it, or in the presence of another’s expression. The prompt for this series occurred a few months ago when I was given great pause resulting from an epiphany: “People – you and I – are behaving with as much cruelty toward ourselves and others as at any time in human existence.” This is a sobering revelation for one who loves humanity.
The American writer Dorothy Allison wrote: “I would rather go naked than wear the cloak society has made for me.” This sentiment reflects a profound wisdom: The unique force that each of us are is not to be constrained or inure itself to the conforming intent of another. This notwithstanding, there is a profoundly life-affirming intent within all societies; it however is largely inaccessible. The fabric of our societal cloak prevents our access to this light. The fabric’s yarn is made of ignorance and naivete; the warp is of dogma and belief, and its weft, of dissonance, deprivation and fear.
In our wearing of this cloak we emulate, and thus animate the fabric’s character, falsely believing its qualities to be our own and befitting us. The worlds we then create are fraught with the angst of the circumstances of our creation.
Anger binds this cloak tightly. The bindings are specific expressions of anger. Not all anger is binding. There are at least two types that are empowering. In this post I will specify one such type. Those posts which follow will delineate those that bind; so too, they possess no life affirming function. My intent with this series is to invite, through increased awareness, the freeing of ourselves from these forms of anger.
The last in this series will be a brief piece on another form of anger that which is a positive expression: One few of us are capable of accessing. I will use German psychotherapist Bert Hellinger’s model delineating seven types of anger to catalyze my articulation of this subject.
The first type of anger in Hellinger’s model is that which is strengthening and enabling. He expressed it in the second-person and I will do the same here. It is in response to an attack or an injustice against you or those in your care. This anger is constructive and enabling. It makes you strong. It enables you to take effective and prudent action. This anger equips you to defend and assert myself with the appropriate anger and rage for the situation. It does so by rousing you energetically. This anger is goal directed. It is to the point and dissolves when the goal is achieved.
Two small examples of the expression of this anger may serve. One: I watched a brief interaction of two men and a woman in a restaurant. The woman did not seem to know the men. Considering the woman’s response to them, I assume that one or both said something inappropriate. I watched as the woman’s facial expression and body language changed. Then I overheard her loud angry and powerful voice command: “In your dreams buddy! Get away from me NOW!” The men walked away.
I love this woman for ignoring our convention of politeness and powerfully expressing herself! I applaud her!
The second example: A woman had been given a traffic citation for failing to stop for a traffic light. She was incredulous with the police officer’s actions as she believed her driving just. Her outrage impelled her to defend her actions in court. She honestly remembered seeing the traffic light as green when she entered the intersection. The officer saw the woman’s earnest congruity. He wished he had not issued the citation. Unfortunately, the court sided with the cop.
To me, it is extraordinarily important that this woman defended herself against what she deemed unjust. Bert Hellinger once said: “When someone tells you what to do, you owe it to your autonomy to tell them to go to hell.” He is correct! We each need to learn the unequivocal, yet, respectful and honorable art of telling another to go to hell.
We need do this as others constantly impose their intent on us. (We also impose ours on others. We each are unique forces of the Mystery and are to be free from such impositions. We alone are responsible for recognizing, embodying and maintaining our sovereign autonomy. So too, we are responsible for our own lives and will be well served to cease wrongful meddling.
In this regard it is irrelevant that the prosecution prevailed. Given the woman honestly believed she was in the right, it is enough that she defended herself. Decency applauds this woman’s clarity, her deployment of anger and the actions she took! I was the cop who issued the ticket. I respect her hugely!
There is a distinction I learned from the great mystic and writer Martin Prechtel: Compassion is absent of rage. It is present in outrage. Dismissing this as an issue of semantics misses the point. Hellinger’s strengthening and enabling type of anger possesses compassion. Were I to have defined this type, I would have used the word outrage where Hellinger used the word rage. Nonetheless, the women in my examples were outraged. There was no rage! There was outrage. So too, I saw compassion present in their anger.
Seldom, however, is this type anger used cleanly. Generally it is contaminated with a mixture of the various forms of anger. I will write about those in upcoming posts. When used cleanly, the type of anger that strengthens and enables is a necessary force at this stage of our expanding consciousness.
Deploying this type of anger cleanly, in legitimate contexts, will lead us to a consciousness where all forms of anger will be let go of. There will be no need for them. We will deploy only compassion in its stead. In our time, however, this strengthening and enabling anger is yet necessary; it can become an essential force for removing our contemporary and ill-fitting societal cloak. And, so too, move us forward into our task of reweaving how we organize and relate with ourselves and each other.
A few questions for you:
• What is it like for you when you have used strengthening and enabling anger?
• What is it like to be in the presence of others using this type of anger cleanly?
• How do you judge yourself in using this type of anger?
• How do you judge others using this form?
• Are you okay in the presence of constructive anger?
• Do you feel the differences between this positive anger and others?
For fun, look to this site where the Dalai Lama speaks briefly, and differently from the model I offer on anger:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7_0IJTBoNA
Love Your writting…they are very informative, peaceful and helpful in time of need.
This is very well written. Original and thought provoking.
Well written Stephen!
Thank you Stephen, you and Val have been on my mind and I have meant to be in touch. This was excellent and I look forward to more on this subject. Of course, you have always been a master teacher for me and friend.
Tell us more. I am on the edge of my seat wanting the other six types of anger.
Thank you Stephen.
Really appreciate you exploring this topic, Stephen, one of my favorites! In my experience, the source of authentic (or clean, compassionate outrage in your vernacular) is Love. It is Love that desires the truth to be spoken/witnessed. It is Love that desires to right wrongs and create a more beautiful world. It is Love that helps us clarify our values and act from those values.
One of my greatest pleasures is supporting people in acknowledging their truth and embodying the vitality that comes with authentic anger. Certainly it has been one of the greatest gifts I have given myself this lifetime.
Keep on – I look forward to more of your eloquent explorations! ~ joy
Stephen, this was very thought provoking for me. I was at a seminar last March with the author of Plant Spirit Medicine, Eliot Cowan. It was sprigtime and his main topic was anger and how anger is needed in the spring to have that burst of energy that allows for a new start such as buds bursting out of their protective layer! Here in the mountains of Colorado where I live we are having springlike weather. Since it is the first month of 2012, I wonder if some Anger energy is needed for us to break out of our protective layer and show our true selves that are here to perform the tasks that we signed up for? Blessings to you and Valerie.
Stephen! Wow…before I even opened the blog, I felt the energy as fierce heat! You’ve opened something powerful, which looks strangely like Pandora’s box. Thank you for your exploration.
It reminded me of a time when I was a child in the Zen Center. I witnessed as one of the head monks threw a verbal sword at someone and so cleanly released it, that there was not a trace of residue in the air two minutes later. I continue to aspire to such clean exchange when anger is involved.
Thank you. Ajana
Thank you for these helpful musings, Stephen. In my experience, my own and other’s outrage, as you term the “positive” kind of anger, is usually mixed with the other forms of anger and the grief and fear that often underlies that anger. To be in presence of someone who expresses “positive” anger clearly and cleanly is rare.
So, Stephen;
I see anger as an argument with Reality. Anger is a response to expectation of mine that was not met by my world. If I get angry at another person it doesn’t serve them and it doesn’t, IMHO, serve me. The example of the forceful response by the woman may have worked in a public setting and may have had an inverse response in a more private setting, say on the street. I think we can stand up for our selves without anger. Aikido models the behavior of working with the energy of the moment, rather than challenge the energy.
Standing up for ones self doesn’t require anger, does it? Anger connotes being wronged, I think. Rather than anger, strength of belief, a stalwart stance of personal space, creates an energy of empowerment.
Thoughts from a friend
I appreciate your clarity and questions for self inquiry. i have done many different kinds of dances around feeling and expressing my Anger. Noticing the places of avoidance, self deprecation, lashing out, projecting. blaming, being nice and polite All those ways have kept me stuck and feeling separate. One of my greatest tools for me is being self aware feeling the sensations in my body and being vulnerable to share what lies underneath my anger for me this is a precious gift. Of coarse this depends on the situation. Sometime the best appropriate measure is to be strong setting a clear boundaries ” NO you may not….. ect” I still dance with anger and I am practicing being real and pure hearted with out holding back. thank you for the space to have a conversation.
When others lash out the best i can do is notice how it feels in my body and respond from that place. I know when My anger is being expressed in what I referee to as pure, passion, movement, change , connection, intimacy, creativity flourish. Thank you stephen for this conversation.
Hello Jim.
Long time. Wonderful to receive your words. I have not previously responded to responses to my posts yet, with your prompt, I will may well begin doing so with some.
You ask: “Standing up for ones self doesn’t require anger, does it?” For most of us, at this stage of our individuation, and at this stage of our human consciousness, yes, we do. I know a man however whom I have watched many times stand firmly in the kind and compassionately intelligent embodiment of his great personal power: standing for his convictions without anger…as defined so far. So too, I have seen anger rise in him once. Yet, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
My fundamental model includes that the Mystery is unknown and unknowable to the human personality and mind (to everything else too); however, we need to use models. In mine: Anger is a transitional device that we are in the process of going beyond. One of our necessary self-deceptions. The two forms of anger in Hellinger’s model, this one above this comment, and one that will follow at the end, when used in their pure sense, cleanly and without contamination and emotion, may not be anger at all, but instead love. Love enables us to stand up for what we need stand for. The types of anger to be presented between the first and last too have been necessary, yet, we have evolved sufficiently to let them go. Time to interrupt the habits, honor them and retire them.
Thank you again Stephen, for being amazingly in synchronicity with my own process; a process which has taken me to the place where I needed to learn this important lesson about anger. Today. Grace abounds.
Namaste,
Trish
Stephen,
You use words that don’t convey meaning for me. “The Mystery” seems to have special meaning about what is unknown. Hellinger is also unknown to me.
I don’t mean to say anger is not present, rather it need not be encouraged. Anger is an emotion, and like all emotions, serves a purpose. Fear lets me know to wake up and pay attention. It reminds me that I cannot know the future and to stop imagining a scary outcome.
Anger tells me I am projecting some intention, some expectation or some story on the universe that is not being met with Reality.
I don’t think we are disagreeing. This is an evolutionary process. I enjoy the Spiral Dynamic model developed by Claire Graves and enhanced by Ken Wilber. And, while understanding the process, I want to hold myself to the understanding that I am moving toward a cleaner standard of self expression. I want to recognize that Anger is a secondary emotion, hiding something, some lesson for me.
âPeople â you and I â are behaving with as much cruelty toward ourselves and others as at any time in human existence. This is a sobering revelation for one who loves humanity.”
I can’t join you in this. I cannot know what serves another, what needs are being met by their behaviors nor what outcomes emerge from their behaviors. I rest in the confidence that the world is turning perfectly. That love is unconditional acceptance, without labels of cruelty or right and wrong.
And I love the discussion!
Thanks for this discussion.
I enjoyed this very much, Stephen! I am a big fan of self expression, whatever form that expression may be!
Jim, I know you to be bright, sensitive and competently trained. Too, you work as effectively contributing psychotherapist. Of course you draw on the dominant psychological model concerning anger: anger as emotion. I look to another model. My intent in offering it is to expand awareness and move toward ending our affinity with anger. Responding more fully to your beautiful articulation would be premature on my part as I have not yet completed my posts on anger.
Thanks for posting this Stephen. I am rarely angry but a sequence of events led me to express my anger. Your journal entry has had me thinking about whether or not I was right in expressing my anger, as such things should make you think. I look forward to reading your other entries about anger.
I certainly enjoyed this post. It is very thought provoking. I am looking forward to your further postings on the subject of anger
a perfect description in a perfect moment for each of us in our own moment
thankyou Namaste.
Arghhh, bless the Anger, it is a great evolutionary force propelling the transformation of the universal consciousness! Such elegant transmutation of energetic charge to build a better world when it walks hand in hand with personal truth and mission; without anger we would not propell society to change and and we would not address such issues as slavery, sufrage of women, child labour, “democratic model of governance”, or law. The recent rise of social movement against a dictature of big business/financial institutions is a great example of inteligent use of this emotion. As people are evolving fast they are re-discovering their personal truth and ethics, they are willing to use anger in most brave and constructive way. Anger is often fuelled by the love of others and our Planet and the compasion towards their situation, for example the results of the distructive ways of big business by exploiting the environment and the way of life of some indigenous people.
A great archetype would be a Spiritual Warrior – the way of a hero – is always to defend and not to go to war for a personal gain. People have been manipulated by media not to express their anger because it is easier to govern them, or channeling the anger into a fear -it has been very distructive – people being made feeling uncomfortable that they are angry and burying the anger deep in the depth of their psyche. It then subsequently explodes and emerges as a very distructive and blind force! Fascinating topic – I am getting very angry that I have to wait for the next instalment of your blog! Munay.
Anger has always been a sensitive subject with me because for me personally it has never ended on any kind of respectful level. If anything I get tormented by it or it ends on a sour note of nothing resolved. My pulse quickens and I have a harder time breathing. The worst has got to be road rage. when someone cuts you off or yells at you out of the window. Flipping the bird or asking you why your in the way when they are the ones at fault. I apply the same principle across the board with anger-try to diffuse the issue first, and if that doesn’t work walk away from that person or ignore it (if your on the road) pretending they don’t exist is really the ultimate answer-it avoids the pain of sideswiping and being followed half way home. Believe me I have had some folks really mad at me for nothing-a door inadvertently hitting them while out shopping-rotating doors are the prime example of hatred. If you move to slow your balked at, too fast and your a rodent-you can’t win-for this I say, smile for the camera and forget the words-they cling to people-its an old trick I learned as a waitress-just act like you never saw anything wrong and they will soon forget and maybe tip you a few bucks extra-it avoids Murphy’s Law and death sentences whih we want to avoid at all costs.
Anger, for me, is often a mystery. It either strikes as outrage or broils like a moldy pot of muck.
Either is neither helpful nor healthful for me.
I find myself testing my serenity as I drive in my car. When anger creeps in I am needing to become aware of what truly is creating this emotional spinning that churns inside and blocks my joy.
Loved your blog. Looking forward to reading onward
Hi Sheri…I trust something of value comes from these posts on Hellinger’s model of anger. Too, after this series is complete, I will add a few things of my own regarding anger…be well and remember to change your posture, and the rate and location of your breathing when you feel angry and you do not want to feel that way…too, change the images in your mind’s eye and your self talk… change all these things to something you find delightful…take good care..
quite impressive!! A real good read!!
Anger ; each thought is recorded in our akashic record. If it is angry, characterising, complaining we receive bad karma. From Dr & Master Zhi Gang Sha “Soul Power Series Books” doing forgiveness practise self clears karma and transforms all life
“Karma is the root cause of success and failure in life” Dr & Master Zhi Gang Sha
Love Love Love PS Website still building
Great blog Steven. There’s so many different ways to look at Anger.
Anger when directed in a positive way is very impressive and energetic. If constructive anger is directed towards myself, it usually says’you can do so much better’ – but anger without spirit can come in short intense spurts but it doesn’t gain momentum and it has no staying power.