Anger--that tricky-feeling emotion...

When I started this blog I made a deal with myself: I wasn’t going to let my ego try to paint myself pretty. Whatever I posted had to be as authentic in my thoughts and feelings as I could possibly be in that moment.

So, my last few posts seemed to me to be a bit more vehement on the angry side than I truly feel comfortable with expressing, yet when I re-read them they seem quite mild and actually resolved by the time I’m through writing. They are nowhere near as scary as some of the things going through my mind and heart prior to writing it down.

I actually found myself appreciative (shortly after the writing and posting) of the people in the Census Bureau playing my “bad guys” roles so I could finally come out of hiding and express to the world who I am and what I’m really all about—just being myself.

One of the most troubling emotions for me to feel has been ANGER--I don't like how I am, how I look, the feeling like a victim that invariably seems to accompany it, or the pain of it. And I spent so much of my life trying to "handle it." I eventually discovered that the key to moving it out of my being for good was to simply allow myself to FEEL it.

But the hardest ones to allow myself to feel it with were those I loved the deepest--and often they had already left the planet.

Case in point: When my dad left my mom at the hospital, she told him out loud that she loved him. He didn't say it back in that moment and he beat on himself for it afterward because he didn't get another chance--it was the first thing he told me when I walked in the door into his arms that afternoon.

My mom very much played the gentle, yet strong, supporting woman behind the man--I so wanted to be just like her. She saw the things within my dad that he struggled with--she and I talked a lot--and one of Dad's greatest challenges was to see himself as worthy. He couldn't give enough of himself, sacrifice enough of himself, to ever be good enough. And because of that, he often took the "angel that he married" for granted, and a few times he was verbally cruel to her when I was present.

You know, those arguments that take place between married people when people just lash out like cornered wild animals fighting for survival. I, being married myself, of course, have done that exact same thing. Words just explode out of you and there is no taking them back so you just add a bit more shame to the old back-pack.

That was the hardest thing for me to feel--an adored, beloved one hurting another adored, beloved one. That one always got placed on the back burner—just didn’t know what to do with it.

I didn't observe my mom--maybe I just didn't see it out a sense of shock--telling Dad in those moments how painful the things he said were to her. She just seemed to take it, and then move on.

Then, when she died, I felt and watched my Dad try to go forward without her. He really tried, even tried dating another woman--but she wasn't able to fill that void left by his beloved Leona. I tried to pick him up, support him, be strong for him--but I knew even then that I was never going to be able to fill that void either. I had a father who was in so much pain and heart-suffering--and it was impossible for me to fix, and I knew it. So I watched it, took on a good portion of his pain, guilt, suffering through empathy, and made it my own.

I made it my own so much to the point that one night I had such pain in the joints of my arms and hands that it finally made me admit to myself, with GREAT DISMAY, that I was ANGRY with MY BELOVED ANGELIC MOM. I was angry with her for leaving me in the impossible position of trying to pick up the pieces of Humpty-Dumpty--because she didn't stand up to him in all those moments to simply say, "Dean--you're hurting me. Stop it!" Yes, I was feeling really victimy and icky and horrendous.

And so, that night I let myself feel the anger towards my mom, think the thoughts that fueled that anger towards her--and bawled my eyes out until the pain in my arms disappeared.

And afterwards I noticed an ease of breathing in me, a release, and that knowingness that the feeling of anger was okay--it, too, was simply a part of the human experience, and not something to be judged as always being a "wrong" feeling.

Sometimes, I discovered, it is appropriate. And just because I felt it in a moment, it didn't mean I had to feel it the rest of my life. I did it, not planning to hang onto it, but to release myself from it. I felt it in order to move it out--and move it out of me, I did. I no longer felt angry with her—but instead realized that because of her in her perfection of being in that moment, I learned something about myself.

I also walked out of that experience knowing that honoring my parents and loved ones didn't mean making all of their choices my own. Honoring them, to me, means thanking them for all their choices and then taking what I learned from their lives of choice and deciding which I wanted to try out for my own life.

I took my parents' journey together and chose to communicate my feelings, thoughts and my intentions with Kelly out loud, clearly. I chose to let him know when something he said or did brought about pain for me--knowing all along (and telling him and myself out loud) that he was just the closest human mirror to how I was internally hurting myself.

I knew I was solely responsible for all the joyful and the painful moments of my life--but also that in accepting that responsibility, I had to do it with full self-compassion. Self-blame and self-condemnation weren't going to change a thing--I'd already given those many years of practice, and they never worked for me.

For those of you who have chosen to read my posts—thanks for allowing me the chance to express that awful anger emotion out loud. It’s more of a gift than you can possibly know…

Much love,
Pen