November 27 — Anger“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
November 27 — Anger“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
November 27 — Anger“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
November 27 — Anger“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
November 27 — Anger“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
November 27 — Anger“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
November 27 — Anger
“We are then in much less danger of… anger.”
I remember feeling anger… like, a lot. It was basically my default setting. I felt constantly frustrated with people and with my situation, and alcohol temporarily took the edge off—but like a boomerang, it always came back harder. At one point I even convinced myself that having a hot temper was a useful tool. That’s the insanity of it. I’d burned my nerves down so far that I was walking around like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. One minute everything’s calm and people are laughing, and the next minute I assume someone’s motive and—boom—I’m snapping, yelling “Funny how?” while everyone at the table of life is trying to calm me down.
Sure, it’s entertaining when Pesci does it in a movie. When I did it in real life? Not so much.
I heard a guy in a meeting say you can tell how an alcoholic is doing by looking at the people around them—are they relaxed and happy, or nervous and jumpy? Yeah… that one hit me right between the eyes. My anger wasn’t just hurting me. It was leaking into the whole room.
Anger is really just me imposing my self-centeredness on the world—demanding everyone act the way I think they should. These days, when I feel that fuse getting short again, I try to pause just long enough to say, “Thy will be done.” That tiny pause is usually enough to get me out of my own head and back into something like sanity. It works. It really does.
When was the last time anger blindsided you out of nowhere—and what helped you get back to center?
