How to Live Well with your Anger

it's ADVICE DOM time, crybabies. to the dungeon we go! this listener's SUBMISSION is a juicy one because it's about a reoccurring theme in season 2 + a reoccurring theme in HUMANING and just being alive on the planet right now in our "apocalypse era"—

how do we live with all the anger!?
how do we understand and tend to what's beneath it?
is there a way to be with it and not be wholly consumed?
can it be a beacon for personal growth?
what does a healthy relationship with anger look like?

our caller shares his courageous exploration, guiding us to lift the cultural and personal veils and explore new ways to be in a relationship with anger.

ADVICE DOM's got some thoughts (and thots), as always.

c'mon down to the cave for some spanky, slappy, advice-giving. BECAUSE SOMETIMES PEOPLE JUST LIKE TO BE TOLD WHAT TO DO.™️

call in and SUBMIT (your own question) --> 760-820-9070

~show notes~ 

• lama rod owens, "Love & Rage: The Path of Liberation Through Anger"
• how does our anger serve us? sarah peyton (youtube) 
• list of needs nvc (also meenadchi's work, decolonizing non-violence + her group practice offerings 10/10 recommend)
• enter to win a free coaching session ~ when you leave a 5-star rating (only) and a written review, you'll be entered into a monthly drawing for a free 90-min coaching session with dana (value of $388). DM (@danablix instagram) or email a screenshot of your submission—take it right before you hit submit—along with the review name/title. winner announcements will be made across platforms!

/// sound-editing/design ~ rose blakelock, theme song ~ kat ottosen, cover art ~ natalee miller ///

Support the show

@danablix on ig 😭 feeling the pull for coaching support? go to danabalicki.com for inner/outer transformation 🖐️⭐️ leave a 5-star rating & review to be entered in a monthly raffle for a free coaching session (details in show notes) 🎁 share this with your favorite boo-hooer 😭

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Crying in my jacuzzi, crying in my jacuzzi.
Crying in my jacuzzi, crying inmy jacuzzi.

(00:28):
Welcome back to the JacuzziVerse.
I know you know how much welove when the advice dom
answering machine lights up tolet us know that there have been

(00:50):
submissions.
The reception is not great downhere in the advice dom dungeon,
at the end of a a very dank butcozy liminal cave system,
tucked away in a far off cornerof the jacuzzi verse.

(01:11):
That's how we know theanswering machine is oracular,
receiving only the most criticaland necessary of inquiries.
All right, just get a punchsome buttons here, rewind.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Okay, here we go oh, dana, this is Stan.
We met during occupycomraderade.
I really loved the last episodeand I've been thinking about
anger and rage so much, so, somuch.

(01:53):
I've always felt a certain fearof being angry outside of my
inner monologue, I guess due tohistorical trauma.
I think that it festersinternally and lessens and
weakens my own light and andlimits my own personal perceived

(02:19):
agency.
And literally I've struggledand I've and literally I've
struggled and I'veunsuccessfully attempted to
figure this pain point out,either through therapy, magic
mushrooms, all sorts ofdifferent deviations, of just

(02:41):
trying to work things out.
And I guess I'm just reachingout for maybe some guidance or
some sort of direction ondealing with that.

(03:02):
And maybe this is a rationalthought when it comes to fear
being, you know, looked at andcriminalized and being
criminalized for being angry andhaving rage.
But I feel that so deep in mysoul and it's just hard to shake

(03:24):
.
So, yeah, I'd love to hear moreif you want to talk about it.
Thanks, bye.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
So this question very much stands.
Listen in for where there mightbe something for you too.
First up, we are in anapocalypse.
You love that light start.
You're welcome.
Apocalypse means unveiling, areveal.

(04:02):
It means truth.
The layers are being pulledback.
And when the layers are beingpulled back and truth is being
revealed, and in that there is ahigh likelihood that in this
reveal, what we have been taughtabout the world around us and

(04:24):
ourselves will get flimsy.
We will see things we were notpreviously allowing ourselves or
allowed to see.
We didn't have the capacity tosee and to feel.
And truth is, lots of folks arenot interested in doing that,

(04:45):
but those of us who are tryingto develop a relationship to
this reveal, to what lies on theother side of the veils, it's
going to hurt.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
Truth hurts.
Don't tell me truth hurts.
Look at the light, cause thehurt's like hell.
I hope it's like hell, cause Ihope it's like hell.

Speaker 1 (05:10):
We'll see the boundaries that have been
crossed and anger will be anaccurate and appropriate
response and we cannot bypassthat experience, reject it,
resist it, brush it under therug.
We're going to have to turntowards it.

(05:30):
Stan, I hear you turningtowards it in this intensified
moment of change.
We're in our apocalypse era,but the fact that you're turning
towards it and you're curiousabout it matters.
This is a process.
You are a process.

(05:51):
None of this is supposed to beeasy.
So the fact that you have tunedinto the challenge of it means
you're paying attention.
The challenge of it meansyou're paying attention.
And what if?
By honoring and being curious,pulling back your own veils,

(06:18):
cultures' veils, the veils ofwhite supremacy has not been
unsuccessful?
That by showing up and beingcurious and I hear some
compassion with yourself thatthat is the definition of
success.
Success isn't measured bywhether you still feel angry or

(06:40):
not.
It's measured in yourwillingness, angry or not, it's
measured in your willingness.
It's measured in your courageto keep facing yourself.
I bet there's so much more youknow about yourself now than you
did before the therapy and themushrooms and all the other ways

(07:04):
in which you've been exploringyour anger, your rage, the
lineage of it, the historicaltrauma of it, ancestral trauma
of it, those who commit to keeppulling back the layers, to keep
unveiling.
Those are the guides.

(07:25):
We need you In this time.
We need people who have beenwilling, over and over and over
again, to look to question.
So, my dear, perhaps you'vejust been training, preparing to
guide.
What I also hear is a very realassessment the world has not

(07:52):
been designed to hold you inyour anger.
There's not been a safe place,space inside of you, outside of
you Well, I'd say outside of youwhich is going to affect what's
inside of you, as you alreadyknow.
And yes, humans were alwayslooking for some sense of

(08:13):
security and safety and it isvery real that some folks, some
communities, especially peopleof the global majority, that
safety has never even existedand the vulnerability necessary

(08:36):
to really explore and expresshas perhaps not had all the
space it has needed to grow, tobe cultivated.
Vulnerability is a practice, itis a risk.
Also, know that when it comesto rage and anger, most of us,
most people, do not have theresources to deal with this, to

(08:59):
deal with these emotions.
I think we can look around theworld around us right now and
see how hurt we all are.
And there's that adage hurtpeople will hurt people, and
there's no antidote.
There's only tending to thewoundedness.

(09:23):
There's only finding somepresence inside of the
apocalypse, some groundedness.
Stan, the fact that you arestill willing and still, and the

(09:44):
depth and breadth of thoseemotions inside of you and
around you is a very potentguidance system.
You are being pointed in theright direction for you.
Ultimately, you're inrelationship with your anger.
It has agency.

(10:04):
Yes, you have agency.
Oh yes, and if you feel likeother people, systems, are
trying to control your anger,it's worth looking at whether
you are trying to control youranger.
You get to choose therelationship you have with it.

(10:25):
Maybe you don't have a lot ofmodels for what a healthy
relationship with anger lookslike Most of us don't but that
doesn't mean that you can'tbuild one.
It will take time, it will takeintention, but think of what it

(10:49):
means to be in a relationship.
It takes a willingness,commitment, compassion,
understanding, curiosity,willingness to show up over and
over forgiveness boundaries.
Those are just some of thethings that I invite you to look
at in terms of yourrelationship.

(11:09):
Make it your own, make ittogether.
This is yours.
Behind anger is so often hurtand as you turn towards those
hurts, to understand the angerright, this is being in
relationship.

(11:31):
When you look at any of thosehurts, it's worth looking at the
needs being met or unmet.
I mean usually unmet if we'rehurting, if we're experiencing
pain, usually unmet if we'rehurting, if we're experiencing
pain and so turn there, what arethose unmet needs driving that
hurt, thus giving rise to theprobably appropriate emotional

(11:56):
response of anger?
His anger is genuine.
Even just having the emotionand saying it, I am angry.
That is an important littlecommunication inside of your
brain, some little prefrontalcortex activity to acknowledge
the emotion and then givingyourself permission to peel the

(12:16):
layers back on it.
What is beneath it?
And then, what's beneath that,what's the texture of it?
Are you also feeling hurt orsad, or some despair or some
woundedness, allowing thatexperience to be there,

(12:38):
welcoming it?
This is not something to pushaway, to reject or resist,
something to push away, toreject or resist.
I think you can imagine theways in which your anger has
been rejected and resisted byculture, by the world around you
.

Speaker 2 (12:55):
Oh, I know.

Speaker 1 (12:56):
And so, when any of us unconsciously reject and
resist the emotions that werenever made room for, it just
keeps this unconscious cyclegoing.
So your consciousness andawareness and attention and
compassion towards yourselfmatters as you continue to do

(13:19):
your own individual work ofdigesting and metabolizing and
being with your own anger.
Then you, then we, as we all dothis and we must do this we can
join the collective, thatcollective work of being with

(13:43):
our rage, learning how toactually be with it, where it
came from, how it exists in ourbodies now and how we might
actually want to be with it aswe move into our own collective
magnificent evolution.
We all have this.

(14:03):
We all have anger.
We all have anger.
This is part of being human and, as you said, your anger has
been shaped, repressed,oppressed, shaped by oppression.
What if anger is an orientation?

(14:24):
It's like a direction on acompass, and you want to orient
yourself towards your anger, theunderstanding it, the deeper
wisdom of it, the complexity ofpossible expressions, because
that world, the world of fullyfeeling, is the one you might

(14:46):
want to live in, is the one youmight want to live in To help
build even and the supremacygrind culture which has no room
or interest or capacity for yourfeelings is the world you might
want to spend less and lesstime in, make less investment in
divest from.
So there's honoring thatthere's been no failure, that it

(15:23):
has not felt particularly safe.
Give yourself permission andspace to experience your anger,
and maybe that's just acontinuation of what you've been
doing.
Maybe that's finding somecommunity to hold you in this
way, perhaps even a spiritualcommunity.

(15:43):
Perhaps that's going to a rageroom and getting smashy smashy a
personal favorite.
You have agency.
When the anger shows up insideof you, tend to it, accept it,
allow it to be there.
In other moments, when it ebbs,you have agency on how you want

(16:06):
to be with it and how you willpractice with it, and that is a
claiming, a reclaiming of yourhumanity to do that work and
look, not all of the work isyours to do you learning to be

(16:28):
with your anger, the depths ofit, the complexity of it, the
spectrum of it, the lineage ofit, the unique experience and
expression of it in and throughyour own unique body.
This will not make whitesupremacy more receptive or
welcoming to it, to you, but itplays a role, an important role.

(16:55):
Individual healing has a rolein the collective evolution in
the web, because many of us areattending to ourselves and our
pain and our joys, and evendoing this in communities of any
size will make room forunderstanding, trust, self-trust
, relational trust.

(17:15):
Relationship building will makefor better movement building
will make us better movementbuilders will make us better
visionaries together, bettervisionaries together.
I'm going to share someresources in the notes below For

(17:35):
you, stan, for all of us.
Thank you again for yoursubmission, your courage guiding
us with your inquiry, tappingus from the bottom.
We appreciate you and feel freeto send over your submission

(17:57):
down in the dungeon answeringmachine.
Just call 760-820-9070.
That's 760-820-9070.
We receive all submissions.
If you enjoyed what we did heretoday, go over to wherever it

(18:35):
is that you are listening tothis podcast and give us a
rating as many stars Five asyour heart desires.
Five stars though.
Theme music and other musicalbits by the very talented Kat
Otteson.
Sound design and editing by theeffervescent Rose Blakelock.

(18:57):
Thank you, thank you.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
I look forward to playing withyou more in my jacuzzi.
That sounded dirtier than Imeant it, but you know what I
mean.