Anger Flexibility

Train of Thought

Your furniture is not your home. Furniture is “stuff,” things you have placed there as time has marched on. The couch, the art on the walls, the bedroom set upstairs, the carpet are all things you bought or acquired at one time because you liked how they looked, how they felt, or how well they worked. The good news is that, if at some point you decide you don’t like something there is a simple solution — get rid of it. You can go over what you have, see if you still enjoy their company or if the novelty has worn off, and make a decision. I can sit here on the computer, turn around, look at the sofa, and think, “Jeez, what a piece of crap.” Out the door it goes.

In a way, the way we think is like that. In another way it is not. According to many anger management techniques the answer might be to just get rid of the angry thoughts, throw them out like old furniture, or transform them into some other, more pleasant thought or feeling. If that type of anger management works for you, you could be the exception that proves the rule.

Getting Off the Train

When you are on a train, you can’t see the train. You can see the interior, and look out the window, but in order to see the train, you have to get off to get some perspective. Just like the furniture above, the seats, the dining car, the berths, are not the train, but a place for all these amenities.

So how can we get a look at the furniture of our minds – thoughts, feelings, images, and so on? Seeing the workings of our angry minds requires looking from a safe vantage point. If you close your eyes, and cut yourself off from stimulus from the outside, you may begin noticing the stream of thoughts that, fairly constantly, moves across your consciousness like a ticker tape.

When the outside world stops, your mind marches on.

Noticing this can be interesting, because it shows you that you and your thoughts are not the same thing. If you were your thoughts, angry or otherwise, how could you see them. Getting to this vantage point is the beginning of perspective. It’s sometimes called self as context. In other words, not being the furniture in the house or the interior of the train, we also have a way to get out of our minds and take a look at the inner workings.

It’s not possible for thoughts to notice themselves. So, when we “hear ourselves think” there is part of us that is doing the listening.

Now, as you sit there and wonder what the hell I’m talking about, try to notice yourself wondering. Notice yourself having the thought that this is really weird. Or really cool. Who knows?

Observer Self

That part of you that is noticing is your observer self. Because, now that you have been introduced, you may see that is what it does, notices. Actually what the real you does. When you think back and remember that birthday party from years ago, the you that was noticing that experience then is the same you that is noticing now. It’s a safe place.

That observing self, that part of you that notices, has been noticing since you were a kid. It will notice as long as you live. It may not quite work this way, but it’s almost like you have a perch up there in your noggin and you are able to observe all that goes on. It gives you both a little distance and a lot of perspective.

I don’t want to paint a picture of this being easy. It isn’t. It’s not hard like carrying a hundred pound weight around with you is hard, but more like tricky. Or, ah, paradoxical. I love that word.

Here is a little aside for you. As I wrote that last paragraph and said what I am asking you to do is paradoxical, I noticed myself having the thought that using paradox is an easy way out. I told myself that I have to be careful, because I am really not trying to find a way out. What I am telling you here isn’t terribly important to this article, but just and instance of me catching myself in mid-story.

Catching Ourselves in a Story

This sense of being able to see the thoughts we are having “in flight” – I want to be as clear as possible on this – is more of a process than a thing. In that sense, it’s more like flying along next to our own thinking than sitting on a perch watching. It’s part of the whole of us and sometimes – this is when we get in trouble with our own anger – we mistake it for our actual self.

Realizing that we are not our thoughts helps us with dynamic acceptance of whatever happens to be present. It allows the acceptance of all experiences, all thoughts, all of life, as part of the experience of living. It may allow us to let go of some past hurts and begin to forgive ourselves and others.