Category: Anger – Hanh

Preverication

a false or deliberate misstatement; lie:

Dictionary.com

Last Saturday I volunteered to close at the site we staff 365 days a year. I came in at open so it would be a nine hour day…ten if you count the hour I get for lunch…away from home and out of bed. I was trying to be helpful to my team and my bank balance. Mostly my bank balance. I made the decision before I left home actually, so when the offer came I didn’t ask the necessary question…Who am I working with?

I was working with a person who’s opinion of herself in regards to the rest of the team is of a queen bee over her drones. When I worked with her a few weeks ago, she said I “You are so slow. I’m fast.” When I scowled at her she quickly clarified “Because I just ate sugar.” Yes, I hadn’t gotten much processed for the first pack (40 something), but I got something done and it was correct. I tried processing the first pack early on in my tenure with the company which ended with me in tears and my manager and I agreeing I shouldn’t do the first pack until I felt I was ready. I did it that Saturday because I wanted to see if I was ready. Her jab, though self-aggrandizing, placed a spotlight on my self doubt and discomfort at the job I had done. I decided I shouldn’t do it again for another several months.

Saturday she came out and told me she talked to our manager and our manager said “She wants you to do the first pack,” I objected and said I was more comfortable doing the evening pack, she cut me off before I could finish with “No, our manager said I should do the closing pack so it’s done right.”

Saturday was our managers first day of vacation and gave instructions to contact someone else. If she actually did talk to our manager, our manager wouldn’t have green-lighted me working the first pack because of our past discussion. I could have called her on it, but I didn’t. I was angry and instead of confronting her about it I allowed the fury to transform into a soul darkening I’ll-show-you mantra knowing if I failed she’d have to clean up the mess ‘so it’s done right’. I processed and packed over 80.

I’m very pleased I did so well. People do more during the first pack but people do less too. I don’t need to be the best; the middle of herd of phlebotomists is just fine with me. What I am upset about is how I handled it. Though I’m not caught up in the anger of being so blatantly lied to, I am upset I didn’t stand up for myself. I am upset I didn’t protect me from what my psyche sees as a bully, a manipulator. I hate I still fall prey to those people. My protection for now is to not work with her again. Meaning, not working the closing shift which she normally covers and if that leaves my team in a bind then it leaves my team in a bind. I don’t like being around abrasive and abusive personalities, and if I can avoid it I will.

My other need to do is to talk to my manager. On the off chance she actually *did* talk to her on Saturday I need to clarify with her we hadn’t decided I was ready to do the first pack and to tell her I can do the first pack if called upon to do so. The discovery I am just as good and bad as anyone else in the group is the one positive thing from this negative episode at work.

Why am I so focused on this? That is the question. I’m still not back to writing other than here and my journal. I haven’t really discussed this in my journal, but I will. I think I’m taking this person’s behavior as a personal attack on me when I know she does this to EVERYBODY. What I’m realizing as I write this, which is why I love writing here, is if I were back doing what I’m supposed to be doing with my life-Writing-things like this roll off my back because I gain strength in and for myself when I write. Starting this weekend I’m going to force myself, in a nice way, to sit at my computer and try to push past the last of the debris of my fall and start taking those small steps I talked about. I need to stop self-prevaricating that I can’t so I shouldn’t try, for there is strength and honor in the trying.

Back to the Work

Taking the time off from working on what needs still to be done in my head was an excellent idea. I didn’t realize you can take a break from things like that. Well, I guess you can stop anything, even if it’s good for you, but the dedicated unceasing work is what has gotten me so far so fast. (Fast by the world’s standards, it’s been a long slog from where I’m sitting). But now, it’s back to the work. From the start of December I’ve been distracting myself with books I’ve listened to before (Harry Potter, Elantris, 14, Dragons Blood Omnibus), shopping and, of course, eating. It’s no longer and option to let my brain stand still with old stories, spending money I don’t have and eating myself into a coma. Standing still is a mixed blessing though. About 23 years ago I walked the Honolulu Marathon, and in a lot of ways getting my life back has been akin to that long hot day in December 2000. I did fine until mile 16 or so and then it felt like I was walking through amber. I kept putting one foot in front of the other then something in my brain snapped and said it was never going to end, I was never going to survive and I might as well give up now. That’s when I pulled out the Extra Strength Gu Gel with double the caffeine and choked it down with a few sips of water. I finished: I have the shirt and the medal to prove it too. So, instead of doing the Gu Gel at this 16 mile marker in my emotional marathon I did more of a rest and now I know why I didn’t rest in 2000….I wouldn’t have wanted to go back to it.

I have therapy on the 17th, so I’ll make that my official back-to-the-work day. I bought the physical book of Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown so I can use it as a text book and make my own notes and how I want to apply his lessons. I got it with another book called Deep Work by Cal Newport in a packaged deal from Amazon. I’ve started my writing again, I get up at the same time (4:30ish) on the Saturday I have off during the month and write for about five hours and I try to do basic edit or input edits in the evening or on Sunday. It works, but if I can get more work done in the same space of time then I will. It too is a physical book but I might splurge and get the audio book as well so I can listen to it on my way into work during the week. From those books I want to write my New Years Goals so I can break them down into S.M.A.R.T. goals for monthly direction. But again, I need to get back to the work!

Though the work was at rest my mind was still aware of what I was doing right and very aware of what I was doing wrong. My eating spiraled a little more than usual but not to pre-apocalyptic levels which is good, but it was more out of control then my normal stress-eating. I couldn’t get full no matter how much I ate and I couldn’t easily talk myself out of buying the extra bag of oreos no matter how hard I tried. As I explained in An Act of Christmas I need to stay true to my ideal of Christmas and be more productive in doing what I can do to help in the world. Next Christmas will be more of what I want and need it to be by starting this month toward my Act of Christmas 2023. With the new year I feel calmer and more in control. The two packages of oreos remain on my shelf unopened on top of an unopened box of Godiva chocolate a patient gave me for Christmas. It could be I’ve just been too tired to walk the 20 feet to the shelf to get them but I’m counting it as a win. I’m cringing now at the money I spent on me over the last month but I feel it was for things I needed and wanted and not spending money I didn’t have on online police auctions every time my mother irritated me. I think what I’m trying to convey is that I’m better, but I’m not at the finish line. The work yet to be done, the deeper work I’ve been dreading are the big boxes in my dream from 22 July 2022 Dream a Little Dream my closing statement was, mostly pertaining to the boxes still on the shelf:

…(bravely confront the past injuries, resolve the confusion, and end the subconscious suffering to move forward).

Dream a Little Dream, Bloggingfromthevoid.com

I’ve identified the anger at my sisters is more of the anger of the child I abandoned (me) in trying to protect myself growing up. I’m not sure if that makes any sense, but the anger I feel toward my sisters feels immature and the fire from that anger too hot and plentiful to be that simplistic. I’ve started listening to the book by Thich Nhat Hanh Reconciliation instead of reading his Anger book because this realization of where the anger was coming from became apparent and more urgent as I was reading the book on Anger. In Dream a Little Dream I talked about how the boxes were things I didn’t want to deal with and still I don’t want to deal with . As my history of stuffing things I don’t want to deal with in boxes and paying an immoderate storage fee attests, I’m really good at avoiding things. The need to get passed the anger, the need to feel at peace with myself is starting to outweigh the need to just keep the abandoned child placated with cookies and chocolate. I’ve named her Little Dragon because of the fire she evokes and she is going to be my priority going forward for this year. Her and getting the first book of three ready to submit to a publisher. That’s not expecting too much of myself, is it? {sigh}

As Simple as a Cup of Tea

My monk, Titch Nhat Hanh, practiced something called a tea meditation. It’s said he would spend an hour drinking a cup of tea with his fellow monks. It sounds glorious. Honestly, I’m saying that without rancor or sarcasm. In his book Anger: Wisdom for cooling the flames, he talks about how a cup of tea, when drunk with mindfulness, will bring us back to ourselves. The whole world melts away when you spend the time thinking about nothing else but drinking the warm infusion of leaves, smelling the botanical aromas and feeling the concoction infuse your soul with each sip.

I have started my own tea ritual at night before bed. I’m not able to completely concentrate on the tea, I don’t quite have the discipline yet. I also have a bird who demands my complete attention after being left alone all day. I have a small one-ounce cup I try to put out for her when I drink but she doesn’t seem as interested in the tea as she is in pushing the small cup off the desk. She makes me smile. The tea does make me pause, to inhale the floral bouquet (tonight is lemon balm) and try to exhale the feelings of being overwhelmed, overworked and inactive in the direction I want to go. The herbals I drink at night are designed to promote calm and restfulness of mind after the long days I’ve been having, and the spice teas I drink during the day are to get more liquid and less chemicals into my body for better health.

I didn’t practice last night. I was too tired to do anything, including sleep. I was irritated because work was long, lunch was gastro-intestinally distressing and the work environment dredged up some old forgotten feelings from long, long ago of people long since passed. I watched TV eating salted caramels from Costco and stayed up well past my bedtime (8:30pm!) and still couldn’t sleep. I eventually got up around 10pm took some Tylenol then rubbed a melatonin infused lotion on my legs and feet and eventually fell into a quasi-restful slumber. I blamed my restlessness on the family interaction from the night before, I blamed it on working too much, I blamed it on being too tired to sleep. In reality, I didn’t bring myself back to center with a cup of tea after being scattered mentally, physically and emotionally from the day. Rituals are powerful tools, even when they are as simple as a cup of tea.

Sharpening The Tools

Therapy to me has been about gaining the tools most lucky people honed at the knee of their loving and sympathetic parents. It’s hard to till emotional barren terrain with a sarcasm and empty promises. I like to believe I am well on my way to the fully stocked and functioning emotional tool shed I should have graduated college with. If I had graduated college.

The blow to my emotional foundation from last week in Mixed Messages put me in an easily angered and dark state making it hard to be around my family. Then my sister fell and broke her ankle. It brought up a lot of unresolved anger from when I broke my foot. I know, the two aren’t the same but they aren’t mutually exclusive either. I learned there is still a lot of anger in me at the living family. Sure, I forgave mom but it’s easy when you know you’re never going to have to deal with them, or care about them, or be measured and judged by them ever again. The anger I’m still dealing with in regards to my sisters and brother sometimes overtakes me and apparently I’m not as deft at hiding it from them. My humor turns scary dark. Who knew?

The anger was getting too comfortable so I took out my journal and I wrote for a few hours. When I was taking care of my mother I would open a vein and let the ichor run over the pages until the pain receded back to numbness. That was the purpose of the ‘vomitorium’ entries as I’ve come to label them. When I needed more than the temporary peace I limited myself to not just spewing but finding a solution to the bone stuck in my throat. I did a lot of spewing in this entry, about the abandonment, the narcissistic or neurotic tendencies which make me and my sisters who we are and how it affected me directly. It is all about me in my journal, that is the purpose of my journal. I calmed down the anger as well as talking myself through it and I’m turning to my tools to deal with it.

My most useful tool has always been my journal. I can remember writing a lot of posts about how I needed to be a better person, not for my mom, but for me because I wanted to achieve my goals. In some way I laid the foundation I’m building on today, in other ways I reinforced the illusions my mother conditioned me with. Focusing on my breath helps me work my way through acute and immediate stressors so I don’t get wound up in the anger and I remain functional. Forgiving the living is still a tool I’m trying to put to the whetstone but I can’t seem to make contact well enough to do anything but dull the blade. I don’t know why I can’t just wave my hand and say “All is forgiven”. No, I know why. It’s the memories and their words and the not being there when I needed them that present in my mind and refused to be mown down by the dull blade.

I love my sisters. I really, really do. Even when they don’t believe in me. They don’t have to believe in me as long as I believe in me. I don’t let the anger get between us, if I can help it. I need to sharpen my skills at hiding my moods better though. I don’t have to be the happy little clown all the time to humor them but I don’t need them worrying about me and trying to get to the festering angry core of my issues either. Thich Nhat Hanh taught anger has to do with the angry person not the one causing the anger. I can’t control why people do what they do, the only thing I can do is control what I do. Anger isn’t in harmony with Christ’s teachings, it isn’t in harmony with Zen teachings and it isn’t in harmony with a happy and healthy emotional wellbeing. Maybe it’s time to stop spewing in my journal and going to back stating a problem and finding a solution. So, I guess a blank journal is going to be the whetstone for the forgiveness scythe to put in my tool shed. Time to order more ink.

uPDATE

I started reading ‘Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames’ by Thich Nhat Hanh I realized I wasn’t trying to help myself or anyone else with the comments about my sisters. The ultimate goal was for them to read my words and be hurt by them. I don’t think they really know how deep this goes, I honestly didn’t know how deep this anger went until after therapy on Tuesday. I don’t want to hurt them (yes, I do) but the purpose of reading and journaling is to work through it until it’s resolved. into forgiveness. I had hoped this process would be a wellspring of posts for the blog but in light of my Monk, wanting to hurt the person who hurt me is natural but it is not freedom from the flames of anger, it only fans conflagration.

“To be happy, to me, is to suffer less. If we were not capable of transforming the pain within ourselves, happiness would not be possible.”

Thich Nhat Hanh, Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames

Therapy was also enlightening in as much as I learned to get to forgiveness you have to go through (not skip over) the anger. I have to deal with anger as it comes up, like my Monk says, but I am allowed to be angry. There has always been a real fear of anger taking me back deep into the void. Ellen pointed out in the Void there was hopelessness and depression. I’m not hopeless any more, and though I am still medicated for depression I am not suffering with it any longer. I can get angry, I can feel it and learn from it and work to transform it into forgiveness and freedom. This, however, is going to have to be dealt with in my journal and therapy. I will try to express my progress as long as it isn’t a subversive attempt to hurt my sisters.

Not My Circus, Not My Monkeys.

Mom and I hit the rocks, then the reef, then the iceberg over the weekend.  One realization that came from it was startling, sorta dream-crushing and it needs to go through the journal process before I can share coherently.  Sorry.  The other realization is that I can’t make my mother have a happy end of life.  I can’t do it for her, I can’t ease her from her dystopian state into the station where she believes she belongs.  It’s not my job to make those choices for her.  It’s like trying to have a pet polar bear in Phoenix, just isn’t going to end well.  I will be there to help her with her choices, of course, but I’m no longer going to foist them on her.

The fight was bad, things were said, apology made but we’re still dancing around each other not sure when the other one is going to launch the next salvo of words to try and destroy the other.  Neither of us willing to admit we love the other, and there are moments when she talks to me and I wonder if I still do.  I guess I do, I haven’t called the Shady Pines to come and take her away.  She hasn’t called the police to report me for elder abuse, so I guess we are still on an even keel.

What I don’t really like about myself in this fight is the war in my head of how to behave.  I don’t want to be mean to her, yet I think bad things, and wish I had the wherewithal to do what I imagine.  I get too much pleasure out of calling her bluff and watch her try and squirm away from the consequences.  For example she believes I don’t love her because I won’t dust my room or clean the birds cage on a more regular basis because of her allergies.  So, I’m sending Sammy away to my sisters to live for a while.  My reasoning is two fold, I want the feathers that stay aloft in the air for hours, the one she breathes in, to settle down and to see how well she improves and to, mostly, call her bluff.  I won’t let her use my parrot as a wrench in her manipulation toolbox.

It’s those words, the mean words, that I want to get away from.  I know I’m angry right now and I’m working hard to keep my head from swimming in the anger and frustration.  When I start getting angry I start deep breathing and chanting in my head, but that’s ameliorating the symptoms, not ripping out the foundation of them so I can build anew.  I’m at a loss of how to do this though.  How do you plug the holes and snip off the pour spout of the venom in your brain in favor of peace, love, and …YIKES…I sound like a hippie!!  I don’t want to feel the bile bubble up or the desire for revenge or strut the I’ll-show-you posture any longer.  Part of me is hoping this declaration will be enough, that making the choice to do so will be all I need to do to become that loving, peaceful zen-like person…..I guess that is my circus and one of the many monkeys that are on my back.  Reality sucks, and it’s hard work.  Maybe I should rethink the hippie thing.

“I just want to spend all the time I can with you…”

Raise your hand if you don’t think is a guilt trip…..

Yea, that’s what I thought.

Wanting Vs. Doing Vs. Needing

I want……….

  • to go back to school to spiff up my phlebotomy credentials (long story)
  • to write at night and on weekends
  • to have a clean and neat room, with my bed made and laundry done
  • to go on hikes on weekends and maybe learn to Glamp from time to time
  • to make jewelry for gifts and for myself….maybe even to sell
  •  to keep working a full time job so I can have a full time pay

Vs.

I’m doing……….

  • 8hrs a day on a less than taxing job but still need to take a nap in my car
  • I’m registering for school but will have to do it in person instead of online, terrified I’ll sleep through it or fail
  • I clean my room by turning off the light and turning on the TV
  • I get out of bed late on weekends and then require a few naps to get through the day
  • The thought of pulling out and putting away all my jewelry making stuff is exhausting in itself
  • Honestly, I don’t know how I’ve been able to keep a full time job.

Okay, I’m tired right now. I really have no reason to be, other than I stayed up too late last night. But when I’m in these moods I wonder if I will ever be able to have a normal life, if I’ve ever had a normal life. My Mom is insistent that I just need to “push through” and “fight back” and basically “get over it” and I will be fine. Sometimes I think she’s right, very rarely, and I try and spin myself back out of control. I think I need a routine…a “doing” and slowly build from there. I keep changing this idea of what my day should look like beyond going to work, going home, going to bed, getting up and going to work, going home, going to bed.

Right now I’m thinking that Mediation is the direction I should be going in. Of course I can’t do that until I have a space cleaned in my room, which means I need to work in my room, which means I need to do my laundry and find a meditation pillow and make hand knotted-silk strung beads and a tassel for meditation……See how the wanting and the doing are always dancing?

I need to……….

  • JUST meditate

    • I don’t need a clean room to do it
    • I don’t need my laundry clean to do it
    • I don’t need a special pillow to do it
    • I don’t need specially strung beads to do it (yet, I want them because it means shopping and creating)

The only thing I need to do is make time. Or in my case take time.  And take comfort in the hope that the needful will allow for the mental space for doing the wanting.

Revenge Is A Dish Best Served With Whipped Cream

Okay, a rather long title.  I’m still flying a little bit on the cheese cake(s) from my celebratory vengeance expedition at the local mall.  Perhaps I should say that revenge is best dished up with a credit card and someone elses money.  It goes back to the whole “I’m really ashamed of the way you present yourself.” and “I don’t want you to embarrass me” crap that I got from my sister today and my mother on Saturday.  So,  went shopping to buy clothes to wear to work with my sister.  Despite the fact that I got a great deal on the clothes, like saving over $200 on the majority of it, I used the money I’m supposed to pay my sister with.  Can’t have both, money and a sister that doesn’t embarass you.  Pick one.  I do have to say, retail therapy is VERY effective.

I did something I can’t believe I did but I have absolutely no regret on and that was buying a purse that is all leather, that fits all my writing paraphernalia and is just elegantly understated and is so not the tattered bag I’ve been carrying around with me because it fit everything I needed to carry around.  It’s sitting here next to me and the smell of the leather is soooooo nice.

So, let’s address the issues at hand.  First of all, I got angry and went shopping.  Everyone I talked to about how I had been so mightily abused agreed with me, even though I looked horrible, dirty shirt and torn jeans and tennis shoes, everyone agreed that was just out-of-bounds for anyone to say to another person, especially a family member.  But the sting of the anger that I normally would have been fussing at before, even though I’m off my anti-anxiety pills briefly due to supply, has me feeling more empathy for Cyndi and even understanding that she thinks it’s okay.  I’m trying to get beyond the crap our childhood has mired us in, she’s happy as a clam up to her nose in it.  She is hurting me because she is hurting and doesn’t realize it, and I can’t hate her for that.  And I’m going to keep trying to maintain that attitude.

So, the clothes, socks, pj bottoms, purse, make-up, face care and make-up brushes are my ways of compensating myself for the slight by giving Mom and C what they want, me to not shame them in public.  Of course, this doesn’t mean I won’t wear the dirty shirt and the torn jeans when we’re out as a family.  I’m not going to stop who I am because it offends their narrow interpretation of what the world should look like in order to be accepted.  They can just bite me if they think  I’m ever going to be like them.  The one thing I am keeping is my Mickey Mouse watch.  They can pry that off my cold dead wrist before I’ll give that up.

I love my purse.

The Seed Of Anger

I finished reading Anger by my Monk.  He said something that was a bit disheartening.  He said Anger never goes away, its always with you.  He used the image of a house having a livingroom and a basement.  When one is confronted with something that pisses us off it’s the same as watering the seed of anger in the basement and it grows into the livingroom.  When you allow someone to water your seed it just gets bigger, and bigger until your howl livingroom is consumed with the soul eating plant.  (The flower from Little Shop of Horrors comes to mind).  He instructs that we smile at it, breathe deeply in and then again out until you feel the anger return to a seed.  Through practice, meaning mindful walking and mindful breathing so the time spent with the anger in the livingroom is as short as possible.

The thing that gets me is the whole smiling at it.  What if I do that during the irksome têt et têt and I give my anger a smile, it would serve to piss off some people more.  I’m sort of looking forward to the opportunity to try it out though.

I realize I have a lot of work to do in regards to my Wounded Child.  I’ve purchased Homecoming by Bradshaw which is what Connie said I should read to work with my wounded child and then I got a new book from my Monk about how to be mindful in everyday life.  Kind of like the book I read about Holiness in Every Day Life.  Between those two I should be on my way to heal the wounded child and to practice Mindfulness in everyday life so the seeds of anger will never get past the stairs from the basement to the livingroom.  My livingroom is crowded enough with my characters and plots, I don’t need the anger to crowd them out again.

Comforting The Wounded Child

Thich Nhat Hanh says there is a wounded child in all of us in need of comfort and needs to be brought into our mindfulness practices in order to facilitate healing.  He talks about bringing her along on meditative walks, maybe even spending a whole week with her, etc.  As flippant as I’d like to be at this concept I can’t find it in me.  He’s right.  The wounded little girl in me has been sending up flares for me to pay attention to her for a long time now. I’ve just thought it was a way for my anger to flare at my Mom in retaliation to all of her self-centered demands for things like they never were when I was growing up.

Memories of being hit, of going hungry, of being isolated in corners while my mother slept have been coming up in my mind.  Of remembering, or rather not remembering, my mother ever showing me how to clean house, just demanding that it be done, and yelling or spanking me when it wasn’t done right.  Of being called stupid, weird, strange, fat, pig, etc.  I won’t allow myself to believe these taunts, beatings and shunning were malicious, intentional attacks on my as a child, but it doesn’t make it hurt any less.

I guess this harkens back to the whole “getting in touch with your inner child” psycho-babble of the 70’s and 80’s, but as I recall, that just encouraged the rich and self-indulgent to be childish.  This isn’t about getting in touch with your “child” but the “wounded” child.  Two completely different entities.  Christ talks about how we need to become as children, but He was talking in faith, in wonder, in guile.  The wounded child had her wonder and guile taken from her.  Luckily I still have my faith.  I need to work at bringing her back to that child-like state and get away from the angry, child-ish frame of mind.

It seems appropriate for me to comfort her and pay attention to her because I’m trying to re-raise me as well as my mom.  To not only be the mother to her she always wanted and for me to be the mother to me I never had.  An integral  part of that is going to be spending time with my wounded poppet and comfort her, tell her she is loved and wanted and that I am grateful she was born and is a treasure if to no one else but me, and I value that treasure beyond all worth on earth.

I’m not sure how to apply this concept though.  Do I schedule something on the calendar or do I try to remember it in my daily practice and life?  I hope she tells me what she needs because I don’t want to mess myself up more than I already am.