Why Am I So F***ing Angry About This?

“Why am I so f**ing angry about this?”*

“Why do I have to be the one who thinks of everything?”

“I shouldn’t have to ask.”

“I’m so resentful, and I don’t even know why.”

“I just want everybody to leave me alone.”

Sound familiar?

Anger can show up in so many ways.

Sometimes it’s explosive. Sometimes it’s a quiet resentment, a growing frustration, or that simmering feeling that something just isn’t right.

And sometimes, anger is covering something we haven’t even recognized we’re feeling.

I grew up around a lot of anger.

My father was frequently angry, and his anger was frightening. I watched how it affected everyone around him, especially his family, the people he loved.

I made a decision very early on.

I was never going to be like that.

I wasn’t going to hurt people with my anger or make other people responsible for how I felt.

But here’s what I didn’t understand then.

Deciding not to express anger destructively isn’t the same as developing a healthy relationship with it.

I became very good at being reasonable, understanding other people’s perspectives, accommodating, and keeping things smooth.

What I hadn’t learned was how to fully experience my own anger without suppressing it or projecting it onto someone else.

And there’s another layer to this that I find fascinating.

Sometimes anger is protecting us from something happening around us. And sometimes it’s protecting us from something we’re afraid to feel within ourselves.

​

 

Audio Edition

Let me give you an example.

Just a few years ago, I sold my massage practice.

I’d spent several years training a woman who was interested in taking over the business when I left.

I cared deeply about my clients, and it was incredibly important to me that they would be in good hands. I wanted them to have a skilled, capable therapist who could continue supporting them.

And I wanted the woman taking over to succeed.

We’d talked about money in general terms, but we hadn’t established clear numbers or agreements early enough.

In the end, I sold the practice, but I didn’t receive what I believed it was worth.

And I was pissed.

I was upset with her. But when I really started looking at what had happened, I realized I was even more upset with myself.

Because I could see that, once again, I’d put so much attention on making sure everyone else was taken care of that I hadn’t sufficiently stood up for the value of what I’d created.

There was a part of me that knew I needed to be clearer about what I wanted financially.

But there was another part of me that was deeply invested in making sure the transition happened.

What if she didn’t see the value? What if she said no? What would happen to my clients? Would I find someone else who could care for them as well?

Those were real considerations.

But somewhere in trying to make sure everything worked out for everyone else, I hadn’t fully included myself in the equation.

And that was painful to recognize.

Not because caring about my clients was wrong. Not because wanting her to succeed was wrong.

But because I had created something valuable over many years, and I hadn’t fully included myself in the care and consideration I was extending to everyone else.

And I recognized an old pattern. One that has shown up in different ways throughout my life.

Early in my life I’d learned to operate as though taking care of other people and taking care of myself were competing needs.

As though I had to choose.

But that wasn’t actually true.

I could care deeply about my clients, want the best for the woman taking over, and still honor the value of what I’d created.

All of those things could exist together.

And this is what I find so fascinating about our relationships and the situations life presents us with.

They continually reveal the patterns we’re living from.

The assumptions we’ve made. The ways we’ve learned to protect ourselves. The adaptations that may have made sense at one time but no longer reflect what’s actually true.

We can spend years operating from an understanding of life that isn’t entirely accurate, without even recognizing it.

And when something happens that brings those patterns into view, we have an opportunity.

Not just to analyze what happened or decide who’s right and who’s wrong.

But to really metabolize the experience. To allow what we’re seeing and feeling to change our understanding, our perception, and ultimately how we live.

And a lot of the time, anger is a natural and important part of that process.

It can bring us into contact with something we’ve been overlooking, tolerating, or not fully acknowledging within ourselves.

The anger itself isn’t necessarily the problem. It may be part of what helps us recognize that something needs our attention.

And when we allow ourselves to feel it, rather than suppressing it or projecting it, we can begin to discover what it’s revealing.

That’s what growth means to me.

Not becoming better at managing ourselves.

But becoming increasingly free from the unconscious conditioning that has been shaping our choices.

What if anger isn’t the whole story?

Anger often serves a protective function.

It may be telling us a boundary has been crossed, a need hasn’t been acknowledged, or something genuinely unfair has happened.

But anger can also become a way of avoiding more vulnerable experiences.

Think about someone who grew up feeling unheard, dismissed, or unable to express sadness, fear, or hurt.

They may have learned that vulnerability didn’t get a response.

But anger did.

Anger made people listen. It changed the atmosphere. It gave them a temporary sense of control.

Over time, anger can become the most familiar response, even when something very different is happening underneath.

And this is important because the person expressing anger may not even recognize the vulnerability they’re protecting.

There are also two ways we can avoid actually being with anger itself.

We can suppress it.

Swallow it, explain it away, pretend it isn’t there.

Or we can project it.

Blame, attack, accuse, and put the intensity of what we’re experiencing onto someone else.

One pushes the feeling down. The other pushes it outward.

Neither necessarily helps us understand what’s actually happening.

First, we have to feel it.

When anger rises, our first instinct is often to do something with it.

Explain it. Justify it. Suppress it. Blame someone. Fix the situation.

But before we start analyzing what our anger means, we need to learn how to actually feel it.

Anger is not just a thought. It’s a physical experience.

There’s heat, tension, pressure, energy. Sometimes an enormous wave of intensity moving through the body.

And that energy needs somewhere safe to go.

Maybe you need to walk, shake, stomp your feet, dance, scream, growl, shout, or take some space alone.

Maybe you need to cry.

Or take a pen and paper and write furiously, by hand.

Not to make sense of anything. Not to be reasonable or articulate. Just let whatever is there come through your hand and onto the page.

The physical act of handwriting engages your body and your attention differently than typing. Allow the movement itself to become part of the expression.

And when you’re finished, you can tear up the pages, dissolve them in water, or safely burn them.

Not that your anger is bad or something you need to get rid of, but as a act of release and transformation.

In Ayurveda, Pitta represents the element of fire and its qualities of digestion, metabolism, transformation, and perception.

I find that such a beautiful way to understand anger.

Fire has the capacity to transform. To metabolize. To illuminate.

And anger, when we learn to experience it consciously, can help us perceive something we weren’t able to see before.

The invitation isn’t to extinguish the fire.

It’s to learn how to be with it, allow it to move, and discover what it has to show us.

There’s no single right way. The point isn’t to work yourself into a greater rage or force the feeling away.

It’s to allow the experience to move through you, rather than suppressing it or projecting it onto someone else.

And when the wave begins to settle, something else becomes available.

Clarity.

Because when we’re at the height of anger, our perception can become very narrow.

We may be seeing something important.

But we are not seeing everything.

And this is where we can begin to explore what our anger is actually showing us.

Then, get curious.

Once you’ve given yourself some space to feel what you’re feeling, ask yourself:

• What am I actually angry about? Is there hurt, fear, sadness, or something else here too?

• Is there a boundary, need, or request I haven’t clearly expressed?

• Am I responding to what’s happening now, or is something older being touched?

• What belongs to me, what belongs to someone else, and what needs to change?

And perhaps most importantly:

What is this situation genuinely asking of me?

Sometimes anger is pointing toward something in our circumstances or relationships that needs to change.

Sometimes it’s revealing something within us that needs our attention.

Often, it’s both.

I don’t want to become someone who never gets angry.

I want to be someone who can experience anger without losing contact with herself.

Someone who can feel when something matters, when something hurts, when something is unfair, and still have the freedom to choose what she does next.

That’s a very different kind of freedom than simply learning how to calm down.

And I think it’s worth cultivating.

I’d love to hear from you.

​Has anger ever helped you recognize something about yourself that you couldn’t see clearly before?​

Until next time,

Love and Blessings,

 

P.S. This is part of what we’ll be exploring in Blossoming Lotus, my intimate women’s coaching group beginning later this month.

Not how to become calmer, nicer, or more acceptable to everyone around us.

But how to develop a deeper relationship with ourselves, including the parts we’ve learned to suppress, manage, or disconnect from.

We’ll explore the patterns shaping our relationships, our capacity to feel and express ourselves, and what it means to live with greater awareness, discernment, and freedom.

I’m offering a special introductory rate for this first cohort.

Interested? Simply comment with BLOSSOMING, and I’ll send you the details.

​
​