Anger: Dark Night Of The Soul

In Anger: Dark Night of the Soul, following our brief opening practice, we learn that anger is a powerful emotion that can trap us in its distortions of rage and hatred. But we can create safe ways to express it before it builds up. Then in the present moment with new clarity and energy, we can invite healing. Includes the teaching story ‘Ripping up phone books.’ We close with the spiritual practice “Releasing Anger.”

Transcript

Welcome to the third class in this series of ten classes,

Anger,

Dark Night of the Soul.

We'll begin as usual with our meditation.

Sitting,

Remember,

Just as the drama of ocean storms obscures the placid depths below the surface,

So does human trauma hide the quiet depths of our soul.

The natural feeling of anger gives us powerful insight into our core energy,

Often quite suddenly.

A burst of anger can illuminate a strong belief,

A sudden and perhaps startling caring.

A piece of our essence shines forth.

Suddenly,

We feel our passion.

Anger shows us what we care about,

What we are willing to defend or pursue.

Anger is useful to object to injustice and to defend ourselves when necessary.

It can give us the sudden adrenaline to protect ourselves in a life-threatening situation,

To move us out of danger to safety.

Let's look at the purpose of anger.

The purpose of anger is to help us change,

To remind us of the energy we have inside us,

And to use that energy to rally ourselves to take a stand,

Sometimes literally,

To stand up,

To speak up and express our passion.

We all experience everyday anger and annoyance.

We may not like angry feelings,

But as author and therapist Miriam Greenspan says,

Quote,

The dark emotions are purposeful,

Close quote.

If we can acknowledge angry feelings in the moment,

Express them safely,

They will serve their purpose to wake us up,

To fuel change,

And give us their gift of energy.

The distortions of anger are hate,

Rage,

And depression.

Hate and rage result from everyday annoyances and angers being ignored over long periods of time.

Without opportunities for expression,

The feelings build up,

Fester,

And become poisonous.

The idea that depression is anger turned inward has some merit,

But any feeling not expressed can lead to depression.

The critical point here is to let go of whichever feeling we experience and find a way to express it.

Feelings.

There is no filter.

When we suppress a feeling we might not like,

We suppress all feelings,

Like anger.

This is a definition of depression.

When we suppress anger,

We also suppress joy.

When we suppress grief,

We also suppress ecstasy.

As we heal,

We become able to express our natural emotions because we have the courage to express any natural emotion,

Especially the ones which we might not be comfortable with.

When we express our anger,

We have access to our joy.

When we express our sadness,

We have access to our ecstasy.

This allows us to acknowledge,

Feel,

And express the full range of human emotion,

And therefore to live as fully expressive and realized human beings,

Human beings with spirit.

The news media brings us examples of an individual who snaps and commits murder.

His neighbors,

Interviewed,

Described the perpetrator as a nice guy.

He helped me take out my trash every week.

Maybe so,

But there was a probability that he was sitting on years of unexpressed anger that had turned into rage.

And suddenly it was triggered and burst forth with tragic results.

The lesson?

Find safe ways to keep your anger moving,

So that the natural small angers get expressed safely and don't build up into hate and rage.

We can use the clarity that anger can bring to focus,

To energize,

To accomplish a task,

To make a statement,

To act in service to others.

When I feel angry and despairing,

A loving God or spirit seems far away,

Inattentive and unresponsive to my suffering.

I'm being asked to grimace and bear it.

I have learned that God or spirit is in the suffering with me,

Holding me,

Attending me.

While I wait the suffering out,

It waits for me to let it out.

I can let the anger out,

Let the currents of anger wash over me and through me.

This is as natural as the ocean tides that ebb and flow to create currents.

My sailing experience has taught me that the currents run strongest.

The waves are most dangerous in the constricted channels,

The tight places.

And all this time,

The ocean lies stretched out there beyond the rocks and headlands,

Broad,

Expansive,

And capable of holding all the waves in the world.

In my work with individuals and in workshops,

Such as at the Center for Grieving Children or at the Scotland Prison or at the Chaplaincy Institute of Maine,

I'll get a group of people together.

I pass around old telephone books,

Emphasize safety guidelines,

And stipulate no throwing books or criticizing anyone in any way.

Participants do not need to come up with words,

Rational explanations,

Or justifications for their feelings.

They just need the courage to pick up the telephone books and begin tearing them up.

Everyone generally stays in silence to facilitate the personal experience and avoid distractions.

No one witnessing need express either encouragement or judgment.

This is an intimate,

Revealing,

And courageous act that requires each person to use his or her own energy.

Importantly,

I state that I will clean up after the process.

No one has to muck around in his or her own crap after they've expressed it.

Both kids and adults really like this particular guideline.

Once,

I experienced an objection to my offer to clean up.

I had been working with an 11-year-old boy who had lost his father.

In my home office,

He raged and raged,

Yelling and smashing old telephone books to pieces.

After he finished and I began picking up the torn pages,

He stopped me and said,

I want to show my mom.

So together,

We gathered up all the ripped up pages and put them in a big black trash bag.

I watched out my window as he walked out to meet his mother and proudly held up the bag to show her what he had accomplished.

I learned another lesson in the value of deep emotional expressive work,

The bag of gold.

He was celebrating his accomplishment and the freedom he now felt.

Here's all my work,

And now I can let it go.

As participants throw the torn telephone book or newspaper pages into the center of the circle,

The mood in the circle changes.

The pile of ripped paper in the middle of the circle grows,

And participants have the visceral and visual experience to see right in front of them the real and symbolic anger they had been carrying around and living with.

A sense of relief arises around the circle.

Faces look different.

The mood is lighter.

People acknowledge their transformation by breathing easier,

Even laughing as they feel a new sense of freedom.

It is important to allow some time afterwards to share out loud what the experience brought up for each group member so they can affirm and normalize their expression of anger.

Participants usually feel a growing confidence that having done this once,

They will be able to do it again.

Now they have the tools to create a safe environment in which to express and externalize their natural anger,

And do so before it turns to hate and rage.

The exact scenario may change somewhat.

Some people like to yell at the ocean waves,

Or at trees in a forest,

Or rip up newspapers at home in private.

But the gift to ourselves of creating,

And it is a creative act,

A safe and effective method of being able to move anger,

To externalize rage and hate,

To lighten up,

Is profoundly healing and transformative,

Literally enlightening.

We'll close this class with a spiritual practice called releasing anger.

To do this,

Give yourself time and space to feel your anger and rage,

The dark emotions of your hidden spirit.

So prepare mindfully.

Build in whatever safety you need,

Such as setting a kitchen timer for five or ten minutes to feel anger.

It might work best to choose a time at night when it is literally dark outside to mirror your darkness inside.

You'll need a private physical space,

Even if it's just a corner of your living room,

And time without interruption.

Find an old telephone book,

Or some newspapers that you don't want anymore,

And a trash bag,

And have them available.

Sit in silence to center yourself,

And then give yourself permission to feel some of your unexpressed anger and rage.

Breathe your feelings out into expression and externalization.

Put outside what has been inside for so long.

If you want to close your eyes,

Do so.

Now bring the feelings up from your gut and chest,

And out your arms and hands and fingers.

Pick up some paper and rip it up.

Tear the paper up however you want to,

Into small little strips or big half pages.

Let images come of events or people about whom you feel anger.

Forget any need to know why you feel anger.

Just express it.

If words come,

Speak them out loud while you rip.

Continue until you're finished feeling angry for now.

Stop when the kitchen timer goes off.

Rest.

Now look in front of you at the torn paper.

You have been carrying all that around inside you,

And now it is outside you.

It's not all your anger,

But it's part of your anger,

And you have externalized,

Released it.

You can do it again when you need to.

When you are ready,

Pick up the torn paper and put it into the trash bag,

And know this is the last time you will have to handle this piece of old anger.

Put the bag in the recycling bin,

And feel your new lightness and freedom.

Thank you.

I'll meet you next time for Lesson 4 for Fear,

Contraction,

The Natural Emotion of Fear and Its Purposes.

Reviews

Thank you very much for this meditation/talk. Very great idea for dealing with anger. Many thanks 🙏🏻 🕊️❤️💫

The idea of placing my mind on a sacred object is not new to me, but placing my anger outside of myself is! Thank you!

Thank you. I look forward to learning to this again with the gathered materials so I can complete the spiritual practice. 🙏🏾

That was excellent. I became ill for a very long time due to keeping my emotions bottled up.

Thank you. This was very helpful

Brilliant! I SIT💜
I woke a new person this morning at 4 am and I still sit 15 hours later in lesson # 2, grief..I feel peace for the very first time in 58 years! I feel light as air. I thought if I let in the real feelings they would kill me. I'm not scared, it's all gone. I don't know how to explain it, it's just gone. I'm excited. I have a purpose. I have a reason.I can't believe this. I woke up, you woke me up this morning thank you!! and I was not asleep. The bondage is gone. The anger followed suit as did the guilt, shame.... all of the trauma since birth, it's just gone!! it's gone!! This is absolutely unbelievable, my brain is saying you better watch out it's going to be taken away from you, you are not allowed to feel good , don't deserve it,don't get too comfortable because I'm going to take it away! And all I have to do is sit. If ever ,and it will, the feelings come up that I'm not worthy to even breathe the air on this planet I will sit. I rebuke the notion that I am not a child of this universe. I refuse to continue to believe the lies of my mind because my heart and soul stayed intact and was woken this morning at 4:00 a.m. thank you It is an absolute miracle! I sent a private, very personal message to you Jacob as I have been alone in total isolation since April 2020. I don't know how I made it and I don't have to question it that's the amazing part I can sit with it! I was at a crossroad and that's where I met you thank you 🙏thank you🙏 thank you 💜🙏

Great exercise at end to release you're anger, I'm going to try it! Thank you

Wow. I imagined myself doing the exercise he suggests, as he explained it. I feel better already. So i can only imagine how good i'll feel when i do it in real time. Exciting.

Wow this is truly revolutionary and was so needed for me. So many ppl are terrified of any form of anger whatsoever and they avoid and repress it altogether. As a very passionate, sensitive and emotional person driven by social justice aims, anger and other strong emotions often animate me and my work and this talk helped me understand why it is so destructive when I get told to “just calm down” !! Thank you so much Jacob🙏🏼

💖oh my gosh, Jacob, thank you for this💖

Jacob,
Thank you - for teaching me about the liberating method of externalizing. 🙏

Thank you so much for this refreshing approach to anger. So many people, including clinicians, invalidate anger as if there is something wrong with you for feeling and needing to express it. I used to go throw rocks as hard as I could into a lake when I was a teen and often I would scream while I did it. I desperately needed that catharsis then but rarely have or allow myself the time for it now. Maybe I will try to do this telephone book exercise this week since I’ve been feeling it build up the past several days and become toxic.

Thank you!!!!!! I think MANY professionals (therapists etc) do not teach how to express anger in a healthy way. We are all taught to suppress it. Thank you for this talk in honoring anger and teaching how to move this emotion through us in a healthy way.

Thank you for this innovative way of dealing with anger.

Thank you. This has been very helpful. Will do sometime.

Interesting! Thank you