F’sheezy. I ain’t back. I ain’t even go nowhere – except into the deepest veils of my mind. To extract my fear, anger, rage and hatred for all those who stand against me. Raise not your finger to point outwards; instead point steadfast in thine own direction. For I am the cause and creator of all that surrounds me.
Ask not what your demons can do for you – but what you can do for your demons.
A conversation with a patient stirred this up in my head. You are not a robot – we are not robots. We are human beings.
What is about emotions that we shun? She was angry but didn’t know what to do with it. “Be angry!” I said.
What good is it to stuff it way down? To not make time to feel? Sure, the treatment would calm and ease and soothe the emotion, but what of the situation that brought it on in the first place? Surely she would be angry again unless the situation changed.
And that’s the point right there – change. How can we possibly change the outcome if we didn’t get angry? If we didn’t feel sadness? And how would we know that we should keep doing what we’re doing if we didn’t feel happy wash over our being?
CTK
I’ve thrown no punches in the last couple of weeks, yet I’ve thrown many. Discontentment set in a few weeks ago with impact and follow-through in punching, so in typical fashion, I restructured my approach to focus on punching in air with light dumbells only.
So, whilst I’ve thrown many punches, I’ve not hit a single thing. This is momentous for me as an advocate that nothing improves in a vacuum. At times I’ve even said that throwing punches in air has zero value.
But right now, at this very second, I’ll concede that I was wrong. Punching in air has helped me defocus on the aspects of training that were troubling me during heavy bag or pad work.
Instead I gave myself room to breathe and contemplate. My fists have been given a long overdue rest, even though I have no doubt that arthritic conditions await me soon enough through overuse.
Sometimes you have to take a step back, regroup and evaluate your training methods. After having fought adrenal fatigue, a battle I lost ultimately in 2010, I have become increasingly cautious about a mind state which pushes an unwilling body to yield.
Step back. Breathe. And when the time is right… only when the time is right, move forwards, fast.
*click on the hidden links to unlock articles on body language, creativity and aggression.
First was the email riding my ass on the website updates. It’s a volunteer position for my acupuncture association and I’m the in-betweener for the website. She didn’t even direct the new member in the right fashion. He was supposed to have been told to submit a bio and a picture to me. Instead, I get this email from her telling me to ‘update the website’ with a spreadsheet attached. One week later, she’s riding my ass. I’d had enough. I told her, “Look. I see over 40 patients a week, have two kids, homeschool three days a week, train Kung-Fu, etc, etc and this is a volunteer position.” She apologized.
Next was the no-show at my house to fix the reverse osmosis spigot. First the guy no-shows on my wife. I call the company and talk to a woman who says she’ll call me right back. Thirty minutes goes by, I call again, a guy tells me he’ll call me right back. Nobody calls. My wife calls me and tells me some guy left a message on the home phone – couldn’t call to cancel because he didn’t have cell service while at a clients house, who probably had a land-line, on a Friday afternoon. Riiight. Monday afternoon, technician shows up with a work-order that says, “Client angry – don’t be late!”
Finally it was the Realtors coming through my clinic while my new patient told me about his possible cancer diagnosis. They’re selling the building I’m in and I’m pretty sure I get to know when there’s going to be a showing. I had to blast at the Realtors for their lack of professionalism and then call my landlord (who is a home-builder and Realtor himself) and blast at him. Apologies all around.
Friday was about the mettle. It was about getting angry at the appropriate times to get what I wanted – what I felt I deserved: respect. Friday was about cleaning sh*t up.
Make it yours,
CTK
Its been a while since I was in a fight, which kind of renders my 17 years of martial arts training a bit redundant. But, it has only been a few hours since I was in the company of assholes and bitches. I define these people as bitter individuals who try to make their own lives a little less meaningless by ridiculing other people. Such ridicule can be fairly superficial, such as gentle teasing, but more often that not, it is spiteful; often with the sole aim of making someone feel bad about themselves. These people are overtly angry at the world, the circumstances that they find themselves in and generally dissatisfied with life.
What do you despise? By this you are truly known.
Frank Herbert, Dune
Martial arts training did not equip me to deal with assholes and bitches, which left me particularly self conscious when I came across a group of spiteful bitches today. I managed to fumble my way through the interaction, but it was only over the post-event 4 hour period that I evaluated what happened.
Those who cannot work with their hearts achieve but a hollow, half-hearted success that breeds bitterness all around.
Abdul Kalam
Perhaps my esteem took a knock because I took myself seriously after all, a face like mine could only have been designed by a comedian. In any event, looks aside, the issue seemed to be about satisfaction with life. I am satisfied and happy. Such satisfaction is as a result of lack of stressors. I am financially secure, happy with my choices in life and fairly confident. Conversely, whenever I evaluate the attitudes of assholes and bitches there tends to be a direct correlation between their spite, dissatisfaction with their lives and envy. They tend to lack any kind of class and be socially awkward individuals. The spite also finds a way to have manifest itself in their appearance, filtering into everything from facial expression to dress sense.
From the very fountain of enchantment there arises a taste of bitterness to spread anguish amongst the flowers.
Lucretius
The lesson I learnt today was that my reaction was wrong. I shouldn’t take myself so seriously and that haters will always hate. So, I brush my shoulders off and continue. Tomorrow I will wake up, greet the day with the cheekiest school boy grin I can muster and use the following mantra; “Today exists purely for the sake of providing me endless fun and amusement”.
“One thing being raped did to me: It caused me to be sometimes rude to strangers. Not out of anger, though, but out of fear.”
http://www.debraannedavis.com/essays/essay_angel.html
HIS DARK SIDE 