The shape of anger

[mada85]

I had a very interesting experience recently. I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep, and became really irritated and angry about this. It had happened for several nights in a row, and even though first and second sleep have been described as a natural phenomenon, I feel better with unbroken sleep and would much rather sleep through the night without waking.

Anyway, I got up and listened to some relaxing music, and sitting with closed eyes I began to ask myself where in my body did this irritation/anger live. Slow and careful observation led me to see that it was living in my lower abdomen, near my navel. Then I enquired what shape and colour it was. I could see clearly in my mind's eye that it was dark and shaped liked a number of black spikes radiating from a central body. I stayed with this image without trying to change it in any way, just observing and contemplating it. After a while - about 10-20 minutes – I went back to bed and fell asleep. Since then I have had less interruptions to my sleep, I have been able to go back to sleep more easily when I wake in the night, and when I do wake and am unable to go back to sleep easily, I can accept the situation quite calmly, and I use the time for reading or pipe breathing and POTS.

 

[paralleloscope]

A good reminder that we can face our somatic experiencing ourselves and release trapped energy by letting it be felt. Good job and thanks for sharing.

 

[beetlemaniac]

I wonder why I hadn't read your thread earlier... I've been having the exact same problem of waking at odd hours. It'll be interesting to try it out if it happens again! I often forget to feel what the body needs to feel. Maybe it's a symptom of the mind forgetting the body.

 

[mada85]

I just wanted to add that the exercise I described in my opening post seems to have had much deeper and longer lasting effects than just helping with my sleep patterns. I've noticed that I no longer get irritated in a queue waiting for the cashier in a supermarket, for example. The mental aspect of my impatience program starts to run, but there is no accompanying emotional reaction, and its pretty easy to let go of the impatient thoughts and not allow them to steal my energy.

I have found, though, that this technique doesn't work unless the program is running mechanically. I mean that if I think about a program I would like to change, and call it to my mind, and try to provoke the emotional content that I know happens when the program runs, I can't do the exercise. It seems I need to wait for the external stimulus that triggers the program, so that the program has a life of its own, so to speak.

 

[whitecoast]

Interesting experience Endymion. I've actually felt anger in a similar fashion: a dark crimson sun in my belly. Have you ever tried to use that energy before? For myself, I tried to understand the feeling of anger in the context of repressed fight or flight energy. When I tried to access it and allow its expression, I broke into a vigorous sprint in a hurry. I've tried also to use it when needing energy as well, but with limited success unless I did beatha breathing first. I'm not saying it's exactly the same phenomena, but it was interesting nonetheless.

From your experience, it sounds like just viscerally feeling the irritation was enough to free yourself from its control.

 

[Miss.K]

and sitting with closed eyes I began to ask myself where in my body did this irritation/anger live. Slow and careful observation led me to see that it was living in my lower abdomen, near my navel. Then I enquired what shape and colour it was. I could see clearly in my mind's eye that it was dark and shaped liked a number of black spikes radiating from a central body. I stayed with this image without trying to change it in any way, just observing and contemplating it.

I have heard of a therapist that used this technique. I think it might be that some of the problem with emotions like anger, is that one gets angry about being angry, but when one looks at the feeling from outside, without the emotional attachment to what causes the anger (or anger about being angry), the anger about being angry is dissolved, and often the anger in the first place dissolves as well, once acceptance of it is reached.

Once when I was attending Yoga Nidra classes, we had a similar exercise. In a meditation we had to find a pain in the body, and go into it, instead of fighting it. I had a aching tooth, and the exercise worked very well, and the pain completely disappeared.
Unfortunately it did not cure the hole in the tooth that was causing the pain, so as I didn't go to the dentist, since it didn't hurt anymore, in the end I had to get a root canal