Feminine Rage
Have you ever acted out on other people for no reason?
Maybe you woke up with an anxiousness that was unexplainable so you start going hard right away. Running around, getting kids ready for school with no patience. Feeling like a chicken with her head cut off. Then your daughter wants two braids in her hair, but the coffee isn’t done and the fire just went out, so you say no. She keeps asking why? why? why?
At that moment the unknown anxiousness that has been bubbling inside meets all the to-dos that have not been done and you yell at your kid. Knowing she didn’t deserve that, you feel a bit of regret, but you still don’t have time for two braids. Immediately your mind takes you down the rabbit hole..im a bad mother, and I still have to write that blog post, and that write up is expected tomorrow, oh look the puppy just peed, and the other kid still isn’t dressed, and I must arrange the parenting plan, and the suns not out, and why is this house always a gawd damn mess, and and and
whoa, slow it down.
Life gets messy sometimes and it can turn real quick into a quagmire that pulls you down into the depths of uncertainty, lack, and negativity.
It has taken me 30 years to be able to connect the dots back to the original issue when mornings like this take place.
What I mean by that is the issue isn’t that the puppy peed again on the carpet, or that my kid wanted two braids. The real issue(the one that 2 years ago I never would have been able to see)was that I had woken up with a feeling that I was not able to connect with and that I did not take time to look into. This led to mindless do-ing instead of feeling and created the compression of crap.
My daughters teach me every day. They have deep compassion and presence. They know naturally how to play and be silly. And a few weeks ago I saw my oldest daughter figure out on her own what was causing her unexplainable rage.
We were having a birthday sleepover and all the kids wanted to squeeze onto the blowup mattress. My youngest humbly gave her spot up for another kiddo but my eldest refused to be anywhere other than that mattress. She was screaming and crying, interrupting the movie, waking little girls up who had already passed out, and I was bemused. It wasn’t her birthday, it wasn’t even her friends that were sleeping over. Usually she understood times like this when it was not her turn to get what she wanted and it had been years since I had seen a tantrum like this.
I finally picked her up, kicking and screaming, and took her to my room. ¨I don’t understand why you are acting this way¨, I told her. She looked up at me with teary eyes and said I would think it was silly. I said she could tell me anything. Finally it all spilled out. How she was upset her dad was moving to another town, she didn’t want him to go, and she was very very sad.
She cried and cried and then she calmed down. She was able to speak again and when one of the little girls came in upset and wanting to go home, she went and comforted her.
This is a beautiful representation of what many adult women have such a hard time doing-Acknowledging that something is tearing them up inside and then allowing it to come out and expressing through it.
Underneath my daughters rage was deep sadness that had not been met yet. By letting the sadness come up and out she was able to move into a state of flow.
The way we were raised, the social structures we interacted with, the micro/macro traumas we hold, and many other factors can all play a part in how we are able to experience and express through our emotions.
If you were brought up to be the nice little girl, the one who believed anger was a bad trait, crying was a sign of weakness, and fighting was not allowed..
then of course you will have some difficulty claiming your rage and letting it move through you.
Even I still get hung up on the root of my rage sometimes. Especially when its a tender thing, something that is a bit shameful to claim.
But with time I have learned over and over that claiming my shit always feels best. Looking and facing the tender and at times shameful pieces of your heart is not always easy. It takes practice and bravery.
I believe in your abilities. Do you?
