This workshop is an opportunity to explore our anger, the pain beneath it, and the journey to peace beyond the anger and pain. For additional information see the article ‘Anger inquiry’.
As we engage in our deeper personal inquiries, and especially when working on trauma, it seems natural that we re-connect with anger.
Most trauma is caused by a violation and anger is often a response to violation. Healthy anger is fast moving energy that supports the maintenance of healthy boundaries.
When we were little it was often too dangerous to feel or express anger about what was happening to us, or around us, and consequently it was impossible to use the energy of anger to set boundaries. This anger was then stuffed / frozen inside us or we dissociated from it.
As the patterns and messages of our life reveal memories about what happened to us, and how we responded internally, it is common to become angry about what was taken from us or never given to us. Likewise we may become angry about how our internal trauma response from long ago has resulted in a pattern in our lives and limited who we became and are.
Workshop Preparation: Be curious
Find two pieces of wood that will be symbolic carriers of anger and pain. These will be burned in the fire. Remember to ask permission to take / use these.
Find something that symbolizes peace. This will stay with you on your alter or wherever you keep such things.
Anger:
Looking back over the last few months (or longer), when have you felt or ‘touched on’ anger or rage? Make a list of the times with any details you remember.
What ‘lit the fuse’ on this anger?
Was the anger about the same type of ‘issue’ or is there a pattern to when and why anger arises?
What is your first impulse when feeling anger? e.g. ignore, suppress, freeze, escape, express, yell, blow up, hurt someone, break something, hurt yourself, or ???
If anger is suppressed or denied (not felt) then inquire into when this first happened and where the anger might be frozen within you.
What happened if you were angry when you were little?
Where do you feel the anger in your body? Is the anger localized or does it move around? What body sensations accompany the anger? What happens in your heart, digestive system, does your throat open or close, etc.?
Do you have any medical symptoms that could be linked to ‘suppressed’ anger?
Are you fearful of others’ anger? Are you afraid of your own anger?
Is some of the anger you feel your own, or are you feeling the anger of parents or other family members?
Is the anger you feel a ‘protection’ – keeping you cycling in anger, to avoid going deeper? Ironically it may be safer to be angry than to feel what is under the anger.
Pain:
In some therapeutic approaches it is common to ‘work’ on instances of anger and this process can be endless. If anger arises and ‘cycles’ then inquire into both what the initial trigger of the anger is / was, and what is hidden under the anger.
Sometimes we need to sit with (really feel) our anger until it ‘explodes / collapses’ and we can go deeper.
What emotions underlie your anger? Some options might be intense pain or grief or ???
Are you willing to dive below the anger into the ‘suffering’ (violation) that was/is generating the anger?
What was the initial source of this suffering?
Are you willing to sit with this suffering (e.g. pain / grief) and allow it to be ‘digested’ or do you automatically avoid / escape / distract?
Where in your body is your deeper suffering located? How much does it hurt?
Peace:
Sitting with deep emotions underlying our anger can result in them softening, unfreezing, and letting go. Although this might take some time, even a small release can be uplifting.
How can you take your experience of anger, pain and peace forward into your life to motivate change / transformation?
Workshop Process: Three phases of sound work.
Phase 1 – Connecting to and releasing anger
Circle: Describe your current ‘relationship’ with anger (use answers from the preparation questions).
Sound session: 20+ min. Connect with the initial source of anger, with the raw emotion of it, and how / where it is stuffed, frozen inside or dissociated from. Develop a more compassionate understanding / relationship with anger.
Blow your anger into your piece of wood.
Sharing and deepening of the sound work.
Drink water / breathe.
Phase 2 – Connecting to and releasing pain
Circle: Describe how and where pain (or other strong feelings) underlie your anger (use answers from the preparation questions, and revelations from phase 1)
Sound session: 20+ min. Explore under the anger to feel the pain, grief, sorrow or other deep emotions that are ‘hiding’ there. Sit with that deeper pain, grief or whatever and feel it slowly release from wherever it is stored in your body.
Blow your pain into your piece of wood.
Sharing and deepening of the sound work.
Drink water / breathe.
Phase 3 – Shifting to peace
Circle: Describe shifts arising from phase 1 and 2. What would peace feel like to you?
Sound session: 20+ min. Journey to peace, a state where the pain is released, and a soft calmness begins to emerge in the heart and body wherever the pain and anger was.
Blow your softness / calmness / release into your symbol of peace.
Sharing and deepening of the sound work.
Drink water / breathe.
Phase 4 – Ceremonial fire
Lighting the fire, calling in the energies and helpers.
Rattle / chanting around the fire.
Each person comes to the fire twice (once for anger and once for pain) to burn their material and release energy.
Sharing of food and community