Anger, Frustration and New Beginnings

I'm always looking for ways to make sense of the things that happen in my life. Especially in times of transition. Lately, I've had lots of time to think about these things and truthfully, I've been everything from angry to scared to disgusted to elated and then back to angry. I hate being angry. It doesn't suit me. I've spent many years trying not to feel angry and it has taken a toll on me emotionally, physically, and psychologically. Stuffing your emotions or devaluing them, no matter which emotions they are, leaves you feeling numb and useless. If you aren't going to give yourself permission to feel your emotions, what good are they? Human beings were given the ability to feel for a reason. Without feeling the bad, we can have no appreciation for the good. And so, the big change for me this time around has been to allow myself to feel the anger and to take action and make my life better.

Years ago, I had a very different way of dealing with my anger. I was mean and I generally, literally hit the wall or kicked a door when I would get mad. Now, this was years and years before I got married, had a child, or had any life experience to speak of. Later, after I had settled down a little, I began to feel less angry and even decided that there must have been something wrong with me to have been so mad all of the time. After I had been married a couple of years, I began to have problems at work. In hopes of not scaring my husband away, I had trained myself to put a lid on my emotions. Things were very stressful at work and I was trying very hard to be "good." There came a time, shortly after I had my daughter and returned to work from maternity leave, when I became so angry and frustrated that I couldn't be at the job any longer. I didn't understand at the time that the underlying cause was that I wasn't allowing myself to feel the way I really felt. Now, coupled with my anger was a nagging feeling that I needed to be home with my daughter and that these people were really wasting my time with their petty office politics. Although I hated where I was and no longer wanted to do the work I had been doing, I was still trying to be the picture of diplomacy and tact and it really stunk.

I left the job and took another position that I was sure would be the answer to all of my problems. It turned out that the type of work I was doing unfortunately kept me right in the path of petty politics and office drama. Only now, I was driving an hour each way to get to it. My frustrations were still there, deep under the surface and it was all starting to boil over. I started to have panic attacks and all I could think of was that I must be a failure and that I couldn't handle all of the responsibility of this new job. I never imagined that something as simple as expressing my feelings about the work I was doing would be as liberating as it eventually was. I left the job and spent a much needed year and a half at home with my new baby. Of course, this created struggles in other areas of my life and I'm writing about these in a book called Hormones, Headaches & Heartache. I hope to have this finished within the next year and I can't wait to share the rest of the story with you.

I never would have thought that letting myself get really, truly mad would make such a difference. But sometimes, the emotions that you fight the hardest can be the most freeing. Where can you make changes in your life if you let yourself feel the way you really feel? How are you holding yourself back by trying to put on a happy face when you're really miserable? Take a risk, make a change, do yourself a favor! Until then, keep reaching for Higher Ground!



Subscribe to 2 Higher Ground by Email