And the less familiar path
I remember anger. By now we know that our brains are hardly reliable when it comes to memories. The brain reconstructs the past each time we recall it, therefore, memories are vulnerable to change. A bit like a broken telephone game.
But I remember (giggles) some years ago at a Delhaize in Belgium I was walking around the aisles, near the pasta and pasta sauces when a man passed me by and pushed me quite harshly, he didn’t even stop to say sorry. It was as if he didn’t realize there was another person right there.
I immediately felt a fire ignite in my belly, oh so powerful. I was indignant, I wanted acknowledgment, an apology, maybe even revenge. I remember observing how powerful I felt, how anger activated me, gave me energy, focus, a goal.
After noticing how I felt, I intuitively turned towards him and realized he probably had not, in fact, noticed that he had just pushed me. He was an older man, in my memory, the whole supermarket was vibrant and full of color. I was sharp and bright gliding along the aisles, and the man looked gray and unhappy, dragging his body like a snail towards the vegetables section. Of course, that is probably not how it was, but that is how I remember it (what Buddhism says about perception)
I remember thinking how seductive the state of anger is. There is no fear, which is nice. It feels activating, also nice. It feels righteous —amazing. A seductive destructive force. I do not know if anger is as seductive to everyone as it seemed to me at that moment. But I was very intrigued by what I observed. Perhaps I like anger, perhaps I am even addicted to it, to feeling powerful, energized, righteous. It’s an observation I carried with me for a long time.
Anger, so generous in its obviousness became a guide to more subtle emotions.
Days later I remember thinking, in comparison, how uninteresting the alternative seemed. The alternative, no reaction or even compassion was the less familiar path. Anger was familiar, while compassion, or just understanding, was simply less familiar, less practiced, seemingly less rich experientially, even boring. Compassion’s subtlety and depth together with my unfamiliarity made it less readily available. It has taken me much longer to begin appreciating its vastness.
I was very upset this morning. Someone did not show up for an appointment, and when I called to check in, everything I heard sounded like an excuse. I noticed my anger rise, I tried to move on, but I noticed my anger kept rising. Then narratives started to emerge, each one making me angrier than the last… Breath. Movement.
Deep breaths help. Stopping for a moment and looking at the other in a neutral way is also helpful. Asking what is this? is particularly insightful. I noticed the physical reactions to anger: slightly warm face, stomach fire starting, growing muscular tension. Since swiping left didn’t work I decided to engage my body and move with purpose, arrange my son’s toys, plant some poppy seeds that just arrived in the mail. It worked well.
Eventually, understanding arrived. Even a few glimpses of compassion. And with them came the idea that if someone is consistently unreliable, it may simply mean finding another arrangement.
As for today, I’ll clean the house myself.
Son eating a botterham (sandwich) in the Nationaal Park Zuid-Kennemerland, near Haarlem, in The Netherlands.
Self-Ethnography 