Over the last few weeks I have felt my anger building.
I noticed this because I was attracting clients and situations that irked me!
I recognised that I was finally making contact with anger that has been repressed within my body, and added to over the last 40 years, until I was ready to pop. I know this to be the source of a lot of my pain.
I decided that it was about time to start releasing it ~ so I booked the Rage Room.
A place where you can go and smash shit up for half an hour.
I have tried to make myself believe that I am fine, but actually - I am far from fine. And to finally admit this and put some time in the diary to deal with it - consciously - felt bloody good.
My pattern of being overprepared reared it's head and I decided to make a list of everything I had to be angry about, in case I got to the rage room and had a blank moment. I feared this was likely because I am so conditioned to ignore my anger my ability to connect with it is fleeting at best.
I didn’t sit down and do it until the day before my appointment.
I was even avoiding making a list of the things I was angry about!
Whether from friends, spiritual teachers or popular songs, we hear all the time that we need to ‘Let it go’. This feels to me like moving beyond anger, not allowing it to reside within us, so that we can be at peace, calm and centred. But if we have been holding onto anger and resentments for a long time it may not be so simple, and they may be harder to shift.
In tantra I have found that like attracts like, and like energies are required to ellicit healing. ie) if your trauma has been caused by being tied up, it can help to explore BDSM to consciously create the same energetic situation but one where you are now in control and can make a conscious choice.
Thus it seems to me to follow, that whilst letting it go may be a simple mental shift for some people, for others, who have a large reservoir of pent up hurt and anger, a baseball bat is a necessary prop.
A funny thing I noticed about the Rage House establishment was the energy - obviously - there was anger in the air! Everything was designed to work me up!
I had to go up two flights of stairs to use the bathroom. Then I left my water bottle up there and had to go all the way back to get it.
The insurance waiver system was via a very very clunky app.
The PPE was old and smelly.
Even the music that was playing was from my uni days and some of the tunes held some old energy that was unresolved.
By the time I entered the rage room I was primed, list of my life’s frustrations in hand, I was ready to smash shit up.
It felt great.
Each time I felt out of inspiration, I looked at my list and felt a renewed wave of anger coursing through me and I smashed some more.
Half an hour was not long enough, but it was all that was on offer!
When I left I felt light, joyful, centred ~ myself again.
And so I decided there and then to make this a monthly date with myself.
May it serve me in my relationships, both personal and professional.
In practice;
Why am I telling you this story…
because it goes to the heart of what a person-centred therapist is and how they work.
In my tantra and counselling practices my approach is person-centred. What this means is that the therapist’s way of being is the mechanism by which healing occurs, and cultivating a conscious way of being, based around the core conditions of non-judgment, empathy and congruence is the practitioners primary concern.
What I offer to you is a blank canvas and a neutral space for you to come and explore your challenges. Everything that I do outside our sessions to ‘work on myself’, is going to benefit my future clients. (I therefore see my monthly rage room outings as a legitimate business expense!)
I am committed to a deep level of self awareness and have cultivated this over many years to enable me to offer this level of neutrality. I take responsibility for my own emotional baggage so that I am less likely to project this onto you.
This is an ongoing journey and it is a way of being that I am deepening into all the time.
This skill of knowing ourselves and taking reponsibility for our own feelings is what is referred to as emotional intelligence, and it can be learnt and cultivated. To relate with another in this way is the core of a conscious relationship. Sadly most relationships in mainstream society are not operating at this level of awareness, as we often give responsibility for our emotional safety to our partners, just as we have been conditioned to contract out responsibility for our physical health to the healthcare system.
Tantra is a path of recognising what is ours (or someone elses 'stuff') and learning to take responsibility for it.
If all of my prejudices, patterns and conditioning were conscious and healed I would truly be an enlightened being! (Beware of anyone who says they are completely healed.)
I am a human being, and I still have things in my unconscious that I am not aware of, as well as things that I am aware of and working to shift. Not expressing when I feel anger is one of these patterns I am working to resolve, and by doing so I hope to be less passive aggressive with clients, especially the men who call me asking questions that are more appropriate to adult workers than tantra practitioners.
I reflect deeply on all my client interactions and sessions and have supervision to enable me to notice more of these patterns that I may heal my own deep wounds.
Rest assured that by doing my own work and I can support you with yours.
(This post is not sponsored or monetized in any way)
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