I also teach yoga.
This is quite a challenging combination of life situations
to try and navigate.
Because sometimes, I feel like, if I am teaching a practice
that deals in how to be more mindful (which is really the point of yoga, the physical
component is just a side benefit), then I really aught to have my own mindfulness
in check, right?
Wrong.
If anything, being a mindfulness teacher has brought my
anger issues to a head, forcing me to deal with this issue so that I don’t bring
in into my teaching….”Got Dammit Linda, WTF is up with your Warrior I Linda, that looks like Sh#t!” lol not really,
my anger issues are rarely triggered by students who are struggling with a
posture.
No. My anger issues
are primarily triggered by stupidity…and passive-aggressive behavior. And the dumber society gets, and the wiser (and more arrogant, and less tolerant) I
get, the more difficult I find it to refrain from calling
people out on their shit.
And this is really starting to get me into trouble. Because people don’t like to be called out on
their shit. And they especially don’t like
to be called out on their shit in the form and manner that usually ends up coming forth when i am having a moment. Because i don't have any tact, and i especially don't have any tact when i am caught up in the clutches of the emotion itself.
And, even though the anger might be
justified, if i allow myself to react with emotion, rather than
respond with emotional intelligence, then i LOSE. It goes something like this: I feel triggered, and then, rather than work through this trigger
by (1) inquiring as to why I feel triggered, and then (2) allowing myself to feel this in my
body, and then (3) deciding whether a responses is needed/warranted, I tend to
just get triggered, and then I FIRE. Boom. And then I risk losing a client, or a potential business opportunity, or a friend, or a lover. Not that my anger issues have ever lost me a lover, but it could happen. And thank then gawds that the 15 year old Sun understands and loves his momma, and just lets my momentary lapses into anger slide right off his back. He teaches me a lot. He teaches me not to take things so personally...that my anger issues are MY ISSUES, and not HIS. What a valuable reminder i have in this child.
So even if whatever it was that triggered me was indeed stupid,
passive aggressive, inconsiderate, mean, etc. etc., etc., reactions are NEVER
productive. Ever. Like even if I am “RIGHT,” if I end up losing
my sh#t on someone, then I immediately become WRONG. And even if that person deserves to get a “what
for” from me (which of course they usually do), it never feels good afterwards, really. I mean, I may get a momentary wave of relief
from offloading the anger onto the target of my anger, but then the guilt starts to take over.
In the final analysis, I do understand that my anger, this potent emotion, can be a powerful ally in my journey towards wholeness. Because the anger is not really the *thing*; the anger “protects me” from feeling or dealing with whatever what is underneath the anger. Which for me, is usually something related to: fear of rejection, abandonment, death. So, when I feel angry, or triggered by someone else’s bad behavior, the moment I feel the seething sensation start building behind my eyes and working its way down through the rest of my body, I have a split-second opportunity to take a nice deep exhale (step 1), allow the feeling to resonate in my own body (step 2), inquire as to WHY this particular issue is triggering me, why i am feeling threatened (step 3), and then, and only then, decide whether I need to have a dialogue with the perpetrator (step 4).
And much of the time, I am learning that some battles, MOST
battles, are just not worth fighting.
Exhale.
