I want to be careful how I write this post but Ive got to put this story out there.
Saturday evening, after a wonderful day, when I got home for the night I felt something shifting inside of me. It was a feeling that scared me and one that I was not very familiar with. Somehow I had the whits about me to recognize that something was about to happen and I started a casual stroll around the block listening to some mellow music when it churned a little more and a little more.
I realized it was about to be something very negative, very angry and I did - I became afraid.
So, I stopped by the liquor store and grabbed a bottle of wine, went home and had a few glasses.
Im not condoning doing that, but I don't drink and it was just too much to take and believe me when I say I can take a lot.
Now, in the past I've over-shared on social media and I want to honor my commitment not to continue that behavior. But something I am realizing is that I over-shared positivity on social media. To even see the pictures of food, the running and the other achievements along my deploy phase might create the perception that everything is positive in my life and this post is to keep that picture balanced and authentic.
So - what I was feeling and ultimately what came up was rage. And I don't mean the kind of rage that makes one want to hurt anyone, I mean the kind of rage you might see in a baby just loosing it in crib.
I walked into a room in my house, got on my knees and just went with it.
What came up and out was a ton of bricks. One at a time and they just kept coming. The words I said, the volume in which they were said and the tears, good grief. It was not sadness or frustration, it was rage - it was out of control and it was amazing!!!
Even as I type right now I am laughing and laughing about the experience. In fact, Ive been laughing ever since. I even woke up in the middle of the night laughing.
Here is the vulnerable part of this. I don't think I let myself feel negative emotions because I think I carry a belief that they are not good and that they might hurt others. Or, at least I did apparently. Perhaps that is changing and a dream to be authentic is one that will include all of my human feelings.
Once I began letting myself be exposed for behaviors that just didn't fit my character and ones I had connected shame to, things started moving and shaking inside. A cracking open and a relief began.
I had no idea that it was just opening up the space for something bigger to finally come out.
What if our negative emotions can be productive? What if giving them a place to do their job is very very human? And what if raging like a crying baby in a crib is a skill we were born with and it's as fundamental as eating or sleeping?
Now, my roommate was not home - I don't know how people do this with kinds and partners in close proximity.
But I am a grown man that raged like a baby and I love it, I feel safe sharing it and as Ive spoken about it with others this week I am finding that so many of us just don't create the space to rage when we need to.
It felt like I was expelling something very toxic, letting it get out of me. And I don't know how to explain this exactly, but it also let me feel completely helpless, completely and mercilessly exposed.
Ive been sleeping like a baby, singing and laughing. There is a renewed pep in my step and the way people around me are responding to me makes me feel much more connected ... not so alone in a crowd.
Ive also had the opportunity to see unchecked raged within the behavior of another person this week and I don't think I would have recognized it as rage previously. It's coming out as coercive and manipulative and just wreaking havoc on people in their life.
This is a skill that needs a sacred place to deploy and to be safely deployed without feeling ashamed. I don't know how to do that for others but I'm grateful I found a way to do it for myself and I'm grateful that it just happened on it's own and I was able to let it happen.
When you meet yourself like that and go through it and come back lighter, it makes the world less of a scary place. So what, I can get hurt and I can be upset and if I have the right way of processing that I can do this for the rest of my life.
Im left wondering just how much havoc I might have been wreaking on myself and any others over the last year as I kept so much emotion bottled up and pushed myself to just keep working instead?
The reasons for the rage are personal but I will share that they are also so human - it's all about past dreams not coming true. It makes total sense that it would come up and clear out to make room when pursuing a new one. <3
To me, this is an indicator deploy is working and that everything inside of me is lining up in honor of this pursuit. Im not bringing baggage this time, clearing out my sacred space. Daring to go for a dream means risking epic disappointment. Today, I genuinely feel the words "so what" in response to that. Risking disappointment is thinking in terms of problems. What if get it? What if possibility is all the rage? :)
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