July 17, 2025 • 48 mins
Aggression: everyone feels it sometimes. It can be motivating, but it can also be destructive. Inspired by seeing the Superman movie twice over the weekend, Liana goes through how aggression works, why it can be destructive, and how to turn it toward more positive outcomes for you and the people around you.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The views expressed in the following program are those of
the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of
SAGA nine sixty AM or its management.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or text two to one one
or go to two one one dot CA. Hello listeners
around the world on radio, streaming and podcast services. This
is it's not therapy. I'm Leanna Kerzner, and I am
(00:30):
not a therapist, but I am your source for navigating
the madness of mental health using my top ten sayings
for going good crazy. And I'm once again questioning the
wisdom of this is it's not therapy? Oh my God.
Enunciation right off the top. For those wondering, I did
see Superman the movie over the weekend. I thought twice twice.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
I liked it that much.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
But I was a bit taken aback. This isn't a criticism,
it is just my honest reaction. I was taken aback
by how violent it was. Granted, it's not as violent.
You know that scene in Justice League where Superman comes
back and attacks the cops, but even toned down, you know.
(01:15):
As much as I enjoyed the movie, I said to
my husband, is this really where we're at? And he said, yep.
So this week we're going to talk about aggression because
we live in very aggressive times. When it's useful, when
it's not, and what to do about it. Aggression is
behavior aimed at opposing or attacking something or someone. It's
(01:39):
a part of being human, and it's not all bad
if it's used judiciously. If we're trying to protect a
loved one, especially a child, like Superman saves babies, aggression
is extremely beneficial because it prevents us from freezing up
in a crisis. But too much aggression on control, aggression
(02:01):
or aggression that's inappropriate. Oh, big buzzword there. That's a
tough one. That kind of aggression can have negative impacts
on our lives. And who decides what's appropriate right exactly?
That's what makes us so challenging. Society gives us very
confusing mixed messages regarding aggression, who's allowed to do it
(02:22):
and what kind are okay and not okay? It basically
boils down and this is really reductive. But aggression is
good when it's directed at people we don't like and
completely uncalled for when it's directed at us or people
we see is like us, right and okay? Joking aside.
I want to be careful to separate aggression from violence
(02:46):
because I think that the two being equated has led
to problems. Somebody can be aggressive, you know, they they
can state their views genuously, They can aggressively, you know,
pursue their goals without being violent. Aggression is something everyone
(03:07):
experiences sometimes, and we need to accept that aggression that
we're all capable of so it doesn't take us over
and control us. Violence, on the other hand, is something
no one in a perfect world should ideally experience. Right,
(03:27):
They're not the same now, these mixed messages on aggression,
they harm men and women in different ways, and then
non binary people get the worst of both worlds. And
sometimes some men I know are afraid to even raise
their voice or push back or disagree because they'll be
(03:47):
accused of being violent and dangerous because they were given
that message at some point in their lives. Meanwhile, boys
are pushed into terrifying and downright unsafe situations to toughen
them up in a way that quite frankly, girls aren't
when they're that's gonna traumatize any kid. And there's a
(04:11):
continuum there. Men are often treated like they don't have
real feelings other than rage, anger and aggression, right, and
they're mocked if they show sensitive or more vulnerable feelings
by other men and women alike. And again, non binary
people are going leave us out of this. There's a
reason we're called non binary. That was something of a joke.
(04:35):
And women, I'm not gonna neglect this walk this constant
gauntlet of quite frankly, being wrong to someone no matter
what we do. If we're you know, sexually aggressive, ooh,
the big bad thing, like, no, don't do that. That's bad
for children. Right, we're gender traders, we're sluts. And sure
(04:58):
some men like that in theory, but do they respect
those women in practice? Right? You know I used to
do a TV show where that was part of it.
And let me tell you it's not what you think
it is. There is an element where go, oh, yeah,
(05:20):
she's hot, you know, but it's hot in that object
for their own gratification way. Again, remember how I said, like,
men are treated like they don't have real feelings and
they're mocked if they show them because of the aggression. Well,
women put into those roles, those you know, presumably sexually
(05:41):
aggressive roles, well, you know, we don't have real feelings,
and we're mocked if we show them either. There's a
continuum there right the minute you start saying no to
things in that role, Wow, people hostile really quickly. And
(06:02):
then there's the reality. And this isn't my opinion, this
is documented. Okay, women who approach men romantically, like asking
men out on dates, they're still seen as desperate, pathetic,
or crazy instead of assertive and dominant. Right, And you know,
(06:23):
men in dating, you know, in fairness, you guys got
a real tightrope to walk between being the one who's
expected to make the first move while also being the
one who's expected to read nonverbal cues on pain of
getting accused of abuse. And you know, men who date men,
there's this almost ritualistic hyper aggression, hyper sexuality that's normalized
(06:48):
because of that thing of you know, whoever gets approached
is the girl role. It's all really messed up. Right.
Women can't be aggressive in that way without being seen
as unfeminine, and men who don't get aggressive that way
(07:08):
are emasculated. And I haven't even gotten to what happens
if women, you know, display that more standard form of aggression,
and it's it's real simple. We get labeled, you know,
either crazy like I said, or a word that starts
with B and rhymes with itch. And no amount of
(07:28):
attempting to reclaim that word. I don't care what anybody says,
no amount of reclaiming the B word changes the fact.
That's what's seen as strong leadership in men, as is
seen as B word territory in women, to the point
that even on police or medical procedurals, you see that
(07:51):
ice queen female supervise our role. Right, it's not getting better,
it isn't there's still this reaction, this ironic aggression. Whenever
a woman clearly and emphatically says no to someone, there's
(08:14):
a unique how dare you? That happens? And you know
a lot of us have experienced as of being told
our aggression was inappropriate, like you said, off the top
without being told how or why. And that's why I
hesitated off the top, because if it's inappropriate, you should
(08:35):
be able to give some details that's inappropriate without any
you know, description, like look, he was backing off, Just
just chill. There's no fight here, right without something like that.
Just that's inappropriate. That's that's just a shutdown. That's the
(08:56):
fact that that is seen as appropriate is strange. Right,
These things are complicated, And of course there's the Internet,
which is a healthscape of aggression. For aggressions sake, we're
bullying reign Supreme, and even some owners of social media
companies participate in it. I'm looking at you, Elon Musk,
I'm looking at you Donald Trump. Double triple, quadruple standards
(09:17):
abound regarding who gets to show aggression and what type
of aggression is allowable. And I think it's twisted us
all up inside at least a little, because, yeah, aggression
is connected to that caveman brain we all still have.
So it's very easy to try to deny it's there,
because well, that means admitting you don't have total control
(09:40):
over yourself. But it also leads to some groups of
people getting defined by stereotypes associated with aggression, which causes
people to treat them as less than human. If I
say the word thug, that picture in your head that
comes up. Yep, that's what I'm talking about. That it's
not cool, So let's talk about it. When can aggression
(10:04):
be healthy? When is it really a problem? How can
you live a life? We're not afraid of your own
aggression or someone else's. Okay, we can't get too far
into that last one. We only have another forty minutes
of showtime, but we'll at least get started. Do you
have a story you think it would be good for
the show? Are you interested in sponsoring the show? Leanna
atnthapyshow dot com. That is my email. Not therapyshow dot
(10:25):
com is the website at not Therapy Show on social media.
We'll be back after this talking aggression. It's not always bad,
but what happens when it is on? It's not therapy.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot c.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or text two to one one
or go to two one one dot cack and it's
not therapist. Still the inn occurson, I'm still not a therapist.
We're still talking about aggression, when it's healthy, when it's not,
(11:06):
and when it's time to consider seeking help for unhealthy
or destructive aggressive tendencies. You know, Hulks Smash is fun
to watch in a movie, but that's because it's just
a movie. I've seen too many people destroy their lives
because they're just too aggressive. And that's you know, either
(11:28):
they're aggressive too frequently or more likely because they tend
to explode just you know, too much. Just something is
relatively small and maybe they didn't respond badly three days ago,
but they did this, and you know, volcano, Just what's
(11:48):
going on. It's scary, right, And I haven't found these
people to be angry. They don't say they're enraged. They
get very upset when you say that they're angry. No,
a lot of times they're frightened. It's undeniable, though, that
(12:09):
volcano behavior is a problem, and they realize it too late,
if they realize it at all. And I'm just not
talking about men, to be clear, this isn't just a
man thing. I've seen my fair share of women who
just don't know how to engage with other people without
being a victim or victimizer. So if you imagine this
(12:30):
like victim bar it just all the stuff that makes
someone feel bad. It just builds up and builds up
and builds up and Finally, when that meter gets full,
they just explode. And because the person who got exploded
on isn't aware of everything else that filled that meter,
they're just like, what's going on? You know what? I
(12:52):
don't care. I'm just gonna go. And when those explosions happen,
the person who exploded, it's always someone else's fault, right,
Always someone made them. They made me. I had my reasons.
I'm defending myself, I'm fighting back, I'm punching up, except
(13:13):
you're not. You know, individual mileage varies. I can't know
what's going on in every individual person's head. But from
the outside, hate to break it to y'all, it was
something really quite minor and it turned into a massive
thing because of an inability to self soothe. And you know,
(13:35):
because you're being so aggressive with yourself, your self talk
is so brutal, then any slight, sometimes very small, on
a bad day, is a potential catalyst for a gigantic
meltdown because you are constantly under pressure and it doesn't
(13:59):
happen to be this way. These things really are choices,
and people hate it when I say that, but it's true.
I went through this myself. Often people who are in
this state, you know, intermittent explosive. Right, they're enabled by
the people around them. That doesn't mean the people around
(14:20):
them say they like the explosions, but they may get upset,
but they still play the game. Right. These explosive people
learned fairly early on that the most effective way to
get what they wanted in the short term was to
have a tantrum. Even if the people around the person
(14:41):
with that aggression issue clearly didn't like the tantrums, they
gave in to them. And you know, I say tantrum
because these things start in childhood, right. A kid realizes
that meltdowns get them attention from parents in a way
that good behavior doesn't. Even negative attention can sometimes be
(15:02):
preferable to outright neglect. And if good behavior is just
expected and therefore not rewarded, and bad behavior is, well,
that gets somebody to pay attention, even though it's punishment,
it's better than neglect. You'll often hear people like this
(15:24):
who have these bad tempers. They'll say it's just the
way I am, or it's just my personality, and this
is incorrect. Personality is one thing, your behaviors are another.
And self acceptance is a great thing, which is what
it's just the way I am is faking. And I
(15:47):
say faking because you know, if you're blowing up on people,
it's just my personality isn't acceptable, it's behavior, right. We
try to understand our personalities precisely so we can work
with them instead of against them. And it's been my
experience that the most aggressive people I've ever met are
also the least self aware people I've ever met. They're
(16:11):
so busy responding to perceived or imagine threats that they
don't do very much looking inward or looking forward, because
the last thing they'd admit to anybody is that they're terrified,
and they're so worried about getting found out, they're not
thinking through the predictable consequences of those ragers, and you know,
(16:38):
stopping thinking it through, realizing that these things are choices,
that behavior is not personality. That's what I had to
do to tame my own PTSD related aggression. I had
to admit that the thing at the core of it
was terror, and that meant facing that terror. And sorry
(17:01):
if this freaks out anybody, but unfortunately a lot of
the things I was terrified of actually did happen. You
know that fear of abandonment. It it was a reasonable fear.
People really didn't like it when I set boundaries, and
they attacked me when I said no to things, you know,
(17:21):
quietly at least in a regular, moderated voice, but firmly.
I didn't match their energy. And it's weird because some
people respond better to just getting in their face and
calling them names right back, and they can't handle it
when you just go no, I'm not accepting you calling
me that. Please stop. When you do that, they blame
(17:47):
you for everything. It is an onslaught. They retaliate. You know,
I lost jobs. I definitely lost friends, if you can
call them friends. Even some family stop speaking to me
just because I said no. And you know what, on
the bride side, I wasn't paranoid. Oh that really bed's tough.
(18:10):
Was gonna happen on the not so bright side, yikes.
To put this in perspective, I spent years, you know,
I started therapy when I was fifteen years old, and
I warned therapists like, if I do what you are
asking me to do, it's not gonna go well. And
(18:30):
they looked at me with this condescending smile and just
just try it, they'll understand. And no, no, they didn't understand. No,
And that therapist was not there to handle the fallout
(18:51):
of how much they absolutely did not understand. And people
can nitpick all they want, you know, oh you did
it wrong, or oh you didn't do it at the
right time, or all that stuff, that doesn't matter when
someone takes a step into terror and exactly the thing
(19:12):
they were afraid of, and they were assured by a therapist,
oh no, trust me, it won't happen, it happens. But
despite all of that, despite how badly it went, the
reality is I just couldn't live in that dog eat
dog world anymore. That that aggression, that being the biggest,
(19:33):
baddest dog in the yard just so people wouldn't attack me.
Not only wasn't was it not healthy for anyone, It
wasn't me, It wasn't actually my personality. I didn't enjoy that.
It didn't feel good being terrified all the time, just
warm me out. And yeah, it was really hard to
(19:54):
face the fact that a lot of people were just
using me, that they really did love me, and I
couldn't force them to because they weren't really capable of love.
You know I had to accept I was never gonna
be that beloved and cherished person that was. You know,
I was gonna prove my parents wrong about all the horrible,
(20:17):
cruel labels they put on me in childhood. I was
never gonna be that beautiful person. I was just me,
just me, plain, all average, not at all special, kind
of to extremely annoying, absolutely strange and yet completely unremarkable
(20:38):
at the same time. Me. Yeah, maybe I would amount
to nothing. Maybe everybody was always gonna leave me, No
one was ever gonna like me. I was inherently unlikable.
Maybe I was gonna die alone and in poverty. Maybe
all of these terrors were absolutely true. You know they
they probably are true. Canadian media paid as I crap,
(21:00):
and our pension system, you know, it likely won't be
solvent by the time I hit retirement age. If I
make it to retirement age, which is in question based
on some of the medical conditions I have, you know,
I might be on the medically assisted dying plan in
max twenty years. Now, does any of this give me
the right to lash out at other people? No, not
(21:24):
a single thing I just said gives me the right
to lash out at other people. I'm entitled to my feelings.
I'm not entitled to have those feelings be an excuse
to dump on others. And that's it. It is really
(21:44):
that simple, the awareness that no matter what people do
to me, it does not give me the right to
hurt others. If you deny yourself the permission structure for
unhealthy aggression and rage, it is amazing how quickly it stops. Now.
(22:09):
The downside is you have to deal with all the
other feelings, right the pain, the fear, the sadness, the
loneliness that that aggression is containing and burning act so
you don't have to feel it. But you know, is
(22:31):
hurting other people is of waiting hurting yourself worth that
that's a question I couldn't say yes to. Of course,
you know that doesn't mean allowing other people to treat
you like a doormat. Like I said, it's amazing how
people can't handle a simple no. But you know, I
(22:53):
learned to get a lot more okay with other people's rage.
I mean, I'm never gonna like it. Some people are
really scary. But what I have learned is to not
blame myself for it. And that's precisely because hey, I
learned to recognize that I'm responsible for me, other people
(23:15):
are responsible for them, and I've had the same aggressive
impulses and learn to channel it into better. There's no excuse,
and the minute you stop making excuses is the minute
things start getting better. Now, I'm fortunate to deal with
(23:35):
mental health stuff, you know, I've learned a lot from
working with and even being friends with people with borderline
personality disorder. Now, I'm not trying to say all people
with borderline personality disorder are like this, but fair warning,
a lot of these friendships you attempt, even if you
do your absolute best, these friendships do not last. That's
(23:58):
a marker of the condition. Now, BPD rage is something
that we know about and we have studied, and that's
why it's useful. It is the extreme of a continuum
of human experience. We all feel these things, we all
(24:19):
sometimes do these things to a degree, but it's so
strong in people with conditions like you know, borderline personality disorder.
That's not the only condition, ADHD, bipolar disorder, narcissism, I've
already mentioned PTSD, dementia, psychosis, substance use and abuse, traumatic
(24:39):
brain injuries. All of these conditions increase the likelihood of
unhealthy aggressive behavior, not across the board. I said increase
the likelihood, not guarantee. Okay. The thing about studying people
who are sort of certified, yeah this isn't healthy is
things are so big that you can take them. It's
(25:02):
crystal clear, and you could apply them to your own stuff. Now, yeah, okay,
people can't help a traumatic brain injury. But environment is
a huge factor as well. That's why No. Two people
with ADHD or are like. No, two people with BPD
are like. Environment matters incredibly, right. If you're raised to
(25:27):
believe that hostility and aggression might not be liked, but
it is tolerated and enabled, well you're more likely to
think that's normal, and you're more likely to be hostile yourself,
even if you hate the person who bullied you as
a kid. Right, The point is they got away with it.
It worked. They were strong. You were weak. That's the
(25:48):
lesson you walked away with. But bullies aren't strong. No.
On the contrary, bullies are some of the most internally
weak people out there. That's why they bully. And the
thing about narcissistic personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, they are
defined by, you know, a lacking or unstable inner sense
(26:13):
of self, like core self. And that's one of the theories
about why the aggression, why the rage gets so bad.
But the tragedy of people with BPD. Unlike narcissists, who
is always it's the world, nothing's ever their fault, people
with BPD don't. It's not so neat for them, right,
(26:36):
they end up raging against themselves. You watch them do it,
and they don't realize it. Right. When we think of rage,
we think of an angry, out of control, just smashing
up stuff person right, but a borderline personality black split.
It's a phenomenon where a person with BPD suddenly thinks
(26:57):
someone is all bad or a threat that starts off
as sort of you know the phrase cope and seed. Well,
it's like a seed with no cope. You know. The
person may start off seeming open to conversation and they are.
They're trying, right, but absolutely no boundary you set is
(27:21):
capable of being respected when they're in that state, because
you know, in their mind you're evil and you're out
to get them. And if they can't pull themselves out
of that disordered thinking rooted in fear, because things. Think
about it, They're out to get me is a pretty
classic fear statement, you know, And sometimes that fear is
something as simple as they're afraid they made a mistake,
(27:43):
because if they made a mistake, well, then the person's
gonna be angry at them. And if the person's gonna
be angry at them, then they're gonna leave. And that
is the big fear in borderline personality disorder, a big
fear of abandonment, and the tragedy is that the person
with BPD ends up blowing up or running away, usually
(28:06):
both right, only to come back and then accuse you
of a bunch of stuff that you have no point
of reference for a little bit later. And you know,
professionals say you're supposed to validate their feelings, but I've
honestly found that, you know, three out of five times
that just results in more rage because you're patronizing me,
(28:28):
and usually things break down because you set boundaries. They
don't respect them. They don't see anything wrong with that
because in their minds, you hurt them, and they feel threatened.
They need to protect themselves, which usually involves lashing out
and causing hurt themselves. And if you lost the plot
between somebody with borderline personality disorder and regular conversations you
(28:49):
have with your family. Well, you know, somebody in your
family might have BPD, but more likely we live in
an age of unchecked aggression. We live in an age
it's you know, not me, it's you and you made me.
And it's utterly tragic. Precisely for that reason, because you know,
(29:15):
we've studied and documented people with borderline personality desord. They
bear that stigma, but we see that kind of behavior
all the time, and it's important to keep in mind.
We are all capable under stress to greater or lesser degrees,
(29:38):
depending on the person of that sort of extremely disordered thinking.
Someone who you thought was great one minute is suddenly
out to get you the next. Right, none of us
is perfect regarding recognizing our own emotional states, but it's
worth working on it. And here's why. Okay, if we
(30:01):
can't effectively recognize our own feelings, nobody's going to be perfect.
But if we're not reasonably good at it, we're gonna
be absolutely lousy at reading and understanding somebody else's We
treat people with diagnosed conditions as being unable to help themselves,
but that's not true. Treatments exist, and you know, as
(30:27):
I talked about before, the techniques aren't complicated. It's just
terrifying to take that plunge and fall into the abyss
and be consumed by fear and sadness and loneliness and yeah,
a great deal of blame and shame, but you can
(30:48):
come out the other end. And someone like me with PTSD,
someone with BPD, if you take your treatments seriously, you know,
we're better at managing our emotions. And someone with no
formal diagnosis who treats every thought they have as absolute
fact and then acts without any further thought. Right, saying
(31:12):
they can't help it or they're doing their best is
enabling them and frankly, treating them like children. If you've
got one person in your family or friend group that
is allowed to just get away with anything because that's
just the way they are, that textbook enabling, you're not
being fair to the other people who don't behave that way.
(31:36):
And while that person who's behaving badly again, notice I'm
saying behaving badly not is a bad person. They might
have horrible things done to them, but I guarantee you
there's at least one other person in that group that
has seen some issh too and not behaved like that. Yes,
they can help it, and many people with these conditions
(32:00):
do help it. Not only are the oh they can't
help it excuses not helping these people. Enabling is harm.
It is now. While aggression obviously can have negative consequences,
there is a time and a place for it. It's wired
(32:22):
into us for a reason. So we're gonna turn the
page talk about that after the break. Questions, comments, concerns
Leanna at not therapyshow dot com. Not therapyshow dot com
is the website at not Therapy Show on social media
aggression where it fits in our lives in a productive way.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
After this break, No Radio, No Problem stream is live
on SAGA ninety six am dot C.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or text two one one or
go to two one one dot CA. Well back in
the South therapy, I'm still in a cursoner. I'm still
not a therapist. We're still talking about aggression. Now we've
(33:10):
gone the negatives of it, but you know, it's wired
into our humanity for a reason. And I'm going to
give you a personal background on where aggression was helpful
right in control, like Animal in Control. That was a
good movie. When I was a video game journalist instead
of a mental health reporter, there were these big trade
(33:32):
shows for video games. They were like E three, which
is not around anymore, Penny Arcade Expo. You might have
heard his packs, right, And I'd go to those two
well report on stuff. And every single year, EA otherwise
known as Electronic Arts big video game publisher for those
who don't know. Okay, every year, no matter what outlet
(33:55):
I was looking for, EA would lose my appointment. It
was a apparently a thing they were known to do
to Canadian media because forget Canada, We're seen as America's
hat by the video game ministry. You Besoft back in
the day that has multiple studios in Canada. A lot
(34:16):
of Ubisoft games come out of Canada, but they didn't
even have their own check in desk at the UBI
Saft booth. It was US Europe. You don't, I forget Asia,
No Canada. Mexico had its own check in, but not Canada, right,
I guess cause the language, right, but what you'd have
to do at the Ubisoft booth is you'd have to
sort of ask around to find one of the Canadian
(34:37):
PR people who did at least have your appointment.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
They acknowledge, they knew you were coming, so ubisof was chaos,
but they weren't just the absolute rerickery.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
That's not the word I wanted to say that Sea Right,
an Act division, another big publisher, Wow, Okay, Activision deliberately
overbooked their demos, kind of like overbooking a flight. So
just because you had an appointment for a playable demo
didn't mean you'd actually get to play. And you can
(35:14):
imagine how they treated a girl as a less legitimate
player than the guys there. So guess who often got told, well,
you can watch over someone's shoulder, which is not the
same as playing. In an environment like this, you sometimes
(35:35):
have to get aggressive. You have to do it in
a calculated way, but there's no avoiding it. And the
crews that were with me were sometimes they found it
funny how I would literally put my foot in a
door and refuse to leave until I got access, because
that's not really me day to day. I'm pretty you know, Okay,
(35:55):
you know, I don't want to get anybody's face. But
if you're not at least a aggressive as a reporter,
you don't get anywhere. You're lousy at the job. You
do have to challenge people, you know, there's a great
scene in the Superman movie where you know, Lois Lane
Lark can't goes oh you can interview me, and all
(36:16):
of a sudden she's a reporter instead of his girlfriend,
and he can't take it. Sometimes you have to get aggressive.
There are plenty of pr people who delight in stonewalling,
and you know, obviously companies like to cover up the
less good stuff. Governments, yeah, absolutely, But there's also the
(36:38):
other angle to the story where if you just you know,
lose yourself in empathy. Oh, this is such a horrible
story this person is telling, you may get taken for
a ride. You know, you have to sniff out deception
as well. And then of course there's a reality of
the online cesspool of people who cannot take any any critique,
(37:03):
any questioning of the things they like, or any praise
of the things they don't like. Just last week I
had people insulting me because I wouldn't agree that the
Superman movie is a lecture on US immigration policy. This
was before the movie was out, and again I've seen
it twice. It's not It is not a lecture on
(37:24):
US immigration policy. Thank you, Kelly and Conway. The word
immigrant doesn't appear in the movie. Once some reporters inferred
the connection. It's inferred, it's not even implied. It was
their own stuff they put in because Superman is an alien.
(37:46):
But the thing is Superman is literally an alien from
the planet Krypton. That's not a term applied to another
human from another country. And yeah, I'm being a little
aggressive here, partially for comedic effect. But if you don't
(38:06):
have the ability to push back on this, I'm gonna
say it nonsense. You're not gonna get very far in
fact based media. And it's extra hard for women to
do this because men, let's just face it, guys, I
defend you a lot, but you're given greater license to
be aggressive than women are by society. And yeah, there's
(38:29):
a clap back to that, there's a downside, but still,
women are much more likely to be called crazy when
we get angry, especially if we respond to that anger aggressively,
which is why so many women say I'm upset instead
of I'm angry, and that's something I'm trying to train
(38:49):
myself out of. Because no, the politically driven misrepresentation of
a movie about a guy who wears his underwear on
the outside and prominently features a flying dog that is
angering precisely because it's utterly ridiculous to do in the
first place, and it's just intended to destroy fun. Now
(39:10):
it's even harder for people like me to show any
aggression whatsoever because I've got one of those diagnoses associated
with bad aggression. Aggression is a symptom you crazy, right.
I had a PTSD diagnosis in twenty thirteen, and some
people say, well, that was, you know, twelve years ago.
Does that count now? Individual mileage may vary, right, Yeah,
(39:35):
Aggression is a symptom of PTSD sometimes. I talked about
that earlier on the show. But aggression is also something
humans just do, and this is not an exaggeration. I
get dismissed as crazy by someone on almost a daily basis.
And the thing is, I'm probably mentally healthier than these
(39:58):
people calling me c because you know, I went through
it before. I've actually faced my issues. I also worked
in stand up comedy and stand up comics sometimes have
to get aggressive with a heckler. I remember there was
one thing where people are throwing ice at us at
a show, and I don't remember it with Calgary Edmondon
that one, but I finally just pulled up, I'm gonna
(40:19):
lean into this and did you know if one more
person throws that ice, I'm going to come down that
crowd and I'm gonna rip your bleep and bleep bleep bleep. Right,
And it was for a fact, but the ice throwing
stopped good story that one. It can be more serious. Right,
Let's talk about police. Right. Police have to find the
(40:45):
line daily between using enough aggression to maintain order and
solve crimes, to ram all that paperwork through the system
right in a timely manner, without being so aggressive that
you violate someone's rights. And anybody who thinks that's easy
needs to walk a mile and a cop shoes because
(41:09):
you'll get spit on, you know. I found that when
I tried to avoid absolutely all aggression because I was
so I was so beaten down being called crazy when
I was working my butt off every day to be
good crazy instead of bad crazy. When I tried to
deny myself any aggression, any anger, I was more likely
(41:29):
to blow up because feelings you don't feel get bigger.
When I was gentler to myself and gave myself the
affirming message that it's okay to get angry. Sometimes it's
okay to get aggressive, just make sure you're still in control,
that you can stop if someone's going WHOA, slow down?
Hang on? You know. When that became the message it's
(41:53):
okay to be aggressive as long as you're in control,
my emotional regulation improved a lot, because, hey, sometimes real talk,
a situation is untenable and you have to be aggressive,
you know. Extreme example, if someone's beating on a kid
or screaming at a kid, you have the right to
get aggressive to protect that child because that child cannot
(42:16):
protect themselves. That's way different than insulting a waiter because
the kitchen got your order wrong. Right? So, how do
we feel anger without losing control? How do we feel
aggression and keep it in bounced? I'll get to that
after our final break. Questions, comments, any feedback whatsoever? Leanna
at Nontherapyshow dot com, not Therapyshow dot com at not
(42:37):
Therapy Show on social media. When we come back, aggression,
How do we keep it in bounds?
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Stream us live at SAGA nine six am dot C.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or Tech two one one or
go to two one one dot CA. We're back in
a Stoll therapy. I'm still in an a cursor. I'm
still not a therapist. You've got a few minutes left
and we're still talking about aggression, and it's the last
(43:14):
segment of the program. So I'm gonna give you some
stuff to do. Right, How are we aggressive in a
healthy way instead of that unhealthier relationship destroying, possibly get
arrested kind of way. Right, Well, there's a really simple
thing you can do. It's called the ninety second rule.
And basically this is something I actually read about. There's
(43:36):
I forget his name right now, but there's an expert
that preaches this. He had an article in CNBC recently.
But I was doing it myself without realizing that somebody
else had, you know, put their name on it first.
I take more than ninety seconds, but this guy says
ninety seconds just when you're feeling something strong take ninety
seconds to just feel it. I don't time it. That
(43:58):
might help you. My version is just like I'm angry,
I'm angry, I'm angry, and you keep just repeating that
to yourself until you feel it EBB. Same with I'm sad,
same with I'm lonely. Just give yourself time to feel
that feeling. Because what you don't want to get into
(44:21):
is that blind spot. Right. Fear can blind us to things,
Anger can blind us to things, right Sadness can even
blind us to things, And when that translates into aggression,
it's doing that because it's blinding us to the fact
that the other person is a person. So I find
(44:45):
that even if you're still upset, if you got to
deal with something when you're off balance, balancing aggression with
empathy is a great way to stop yourself from going overboard.
Putting yourself in the other person shoes and giving benefit
of the doubt is extremely helpful. Not only does it
(45:06):
control your reactions, and hey, I wouldn't like that if
somebody did that to me, so I'm not going to
do it to them. You know, not only does it
control your behavior, it actually reduces your anger. It reduces
rumination that spinning it again and again. I can't believe
you did that anymy, right, it reduces that by channeling
(45:26):
your thoughts in a different direction, right, instead of thinking
of all the ways your enemies are plotting against you,
it helps you realize that, like, look, do you spend
huge amounts of time plotting against other people? If you
do seek help? Maybe no, really that is you need therapy, territory.
(45:48):
This program cannot help you here. But you know, if
you don't regularly spend time thinking about how to you know,
go full ConA and lamentations for women on your enemies,
realize that regulated people usually don't have the time or
(46:10):
energy for that. If you truly believe that person is
plotting against you, the best thing to do is get
far far away. But even in instances like that, ramping
yourself up for a conflict just makes it more likely
that you will have a hair trigger and you'll go off.
And if somebody is plotting against you, that's exactly what
(46:31):
they want, you know, But it's usually better to go no,
you know what, that person, there's probably just a misunderstanding here.
We can work it out. And even if we can't,
I didn't do anything really horribly wrong here. So my
(46:52):
behavior is about me, their behavior is about them. They
could still push your buttons and if you get a
little hot, but that's okay because again you know they're
pushing your buttons to hurt you, and you know that's
a sign that this is a person that you may
want to spend less time with in future. Right, if
(47:15):
you go into anything with a more confident center, you know,
go in going I'm going to do my best and
I deserve to be here, and this can be a
win win for everybody. But I can only control my part.
Other people have to control them. Top ten Price. Don't
(47:37):
let problems and not your fault, lead to mistakes that
are right. Aggression meets balance. Aggressively pursue your goals. Don't
use aggression to mask fear. Feel your fear instead, feel
your insecurities and tell yourself it's okay. Nobody's perfect. You're
(47:58):
working on it right, and that's all you can do.
It may seem terrifying to contemplate if you were raised
in a home where correction was harsh, but trust me
as someone who's been through it, it's better. And I
am out of time. I better wrap questions, comments, concerns.
Leanna at nottherapyshow dot com. Not therapyshow dot com is
(48:18):
the website at not therapy on social media. Running out
of time You're crazy is only a problem if it's
hurting you. See you next time. Go see Superman.
Speaker 1 (48:30):
No Radio, no problem. Stream is live on SAGA ninety
six am dot co
The views expressed in the following program are those of
the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of
SAGA nine sixty AM or its management.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or text two to one one
or go to two one one dot CA. Hello listeners
around the world on radio, streaming and podcast services. This
is it's not therapy. I'm Leanna Kerzner, and I am
(00:30):
not a therapist, but I am your source for navigating
the madness of mental health using my top ten sayings
for going good crazy. And I'm once again questioning the
wisdom of this is it's not therapy? Oh my God.
Enunciation right off the top. For those wondering, I did
see Superman the movie over the weekend. I thought twice twice.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
I liked it that much.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
But I was a bit taken aback. This isn't a criticism,
it is just my honest reaction. I was taken aback
by how violent it was. Granted, it's not as violent.
You know that scene in Justice League where Superman comes
back and attacks the cops, but even toned down, you know.
(01:15):
As much as I enjoyed the movie, I said to
my husband, is this really where we're at? And he said, yep.
So this week we're going to talk about aggression because
we live in very aggressive times. When it's useful, when
it's not, and what to do about it. Aggression is
behavior aimed at opposing or attacking something or someone. It's
(01:39):
a part of being human, and it's not all bad
if it's used judiciously. If we're trying to protect a
loved one, especially a child, like Superman saves babies, aggression
is extremely beneficial because it prevents us from freezing up
in a crisis. But too much aggression on control, aggression
(02:01):
or aggression that's inappropriate. Oh, big buzzword there. That's a
tough one. That kind of aggression can have negative impacts
on our lives. And who decides what's appropriate right exactly?
That's what makes us so challenging. Society gives us very
confusing mixed messages regarding aggression, who's allowed to do it
(02:22):
and what kind are okay and not okay? It basically
boils down and this is really reductive. But aggression is
good when it's directed at people we don't like and
completely uncalled for when it's directed at us or people
we see is like us, right and okay? Joking aside.
I want to be careful to separate aggression from violence
(02:46):
because I think that the two being equated has led
to problems. Somebody can be aggressive, you know, they they
can state their views genuously, They can aggressively, you know,
pursue their goals without being violent. Aggression is something everyone
(03:07):
experiences sometimes, and we need to accept that aggression that
we're all capable of so it doesn't take us over
and control us. Violence, on the other hand, is something
no one in a perfect world should ideally experience. Right,
(03:27):
They're not the same now, these mixed messages on aggression,
they harm men and women in different ways, and then
non binary people get the worst of both worlds. And
sometimes some men I know are afraid to even raise
their voice or push back or disagree because they'll be
(03:47):
accused of being violent and dangerous because they were given
that message at some point in their lives. Meanwhile, boys
are pushed into terrifying and downright unsafe situations to toughen
them up in a way that quite frankly, girls aren't
when they're that's gonna traumatize any kid. And there's a
(04:11):
continuum there. Men are often treated like they don't have
real feelings other than rage, anger and aggression, right, and
they're mocked if they show sensitive or more vulnerable feelings
by other men and women alike. And again, non binary
people are going leave us out of this. There's a
reason we're called non binary. That was something of a joke.
(04:35):
And women, I'm not gonna neglect this walk this constant
gauntlet of quite frankly, being wrong to someone no matter
what we do. If we're you know, sexually aggressive, ooh,
the big bad thing, like, no, don't do that. That's bad
for children. Right, we're gender traders, we're sluts. And sure
(04:58):
some men like that in theory, but do they respect
those women in practice? Right? You know I used to
do a TV show where that was part of it.
And let me tell you it's not what you think
it is. There is an element where go, oh, yeah,
(05:20):
she's hot, you know, but it's hot in that object
for their own gratification way. Again, remember how I said, like,
men are treated like they don't have real feelings and
they're mocked if they show them because of the aggression. Well,
women put into those roles, those you know, presumably sexually
(05:41):
aggressive roles, well, you know, we don't have real feelings,
and we're mocked if we show them either. There's a
continuum there right the minute you start saying no to
things in that role, Wow, people hostile really quickly. And
(06:02):
then there's the reality. And this isn't my opinion, this
is documented. Okay, women who approach men romantically, like asking
men out on dates, they're still seen as desperate, pathetic,
or crazy instead of assertive and dominant. Right, And you know,
(06:23):
men in dating, you know, in fairness, you guys got
a real tightrope to walk between being the one who's
expected to make the first move while also being the
one who's expected to read nonverbal cues on pain of
getting accused of abuse. And you know, men who date men,
there's this almost ritualistic hyper aggression, hyper sexuality that's normalized
(06:48):
because of that thing of you know, whoever gets approached
is the girl role. It's all really messed up. Right.
Women can't be aggressive in that way without being seen
as unfeminine, and men who don't get aggressive that way
(07:08):
are emasculated. And I haven't even gotten to what happens
if women, you know, display that more standard form of aggression,
and it's it's real simple. We get labeled, you know,
either crazy like I said, or a word that starts
with B and rhymes with itch. And no amount of
(07:28):
attempting to reclaim that word. I don't care what anybody says,
no amount of reclaiming the B word changes the fact.
That's what's seen as strong leadership in men, as is
seen as B word territory in women, to the point
that even on police or medical procedurals, you see that
(07:51):
ice queen female supervise our role. Right, it's not getting better,
it isn't there's still this reaction, this ironic aggression. Whenever
a woman clearly and emphatically says no to someone, there's
(08:14):
a unique how dare you? That happens? And you know
a lot of us have experienced as of being told
our aggression was inappropriate, like you said, off the top
without being told how or why. And that's why I
hesitated off the top, because if it's inappropriate, you should
(08:35):
be able to give some details that's inappropriate without any
you know, description, like look, he was backing off, Just
just chill. There's no fight here, right without something like that.
Just that's inappropriate. That's that's just a shutdown. That's the
(08:56):
fact that that is seen as appropriate is strange. Right,
These things are complicated, And of course there's the Internet,
which is a healthscape of aggression. For aggressions sake, we're
bullying reign Supreme, and even some owners of social media
companies participate in it. I'm looking at you, Elon Musk,
I'm looking at you Donald Trump. Double triple, quadruple standards
(09:17):
abound regarding who gets to show aggression and what type
of aggression is allowable. And I think it's twisted us
all up inside at least a little, because, yeah, aggression
is connected to that caveman brain we all still have.
So it's very easy to try to deny it's there,
because well, that means admitting you don't have total control
(09:40):
over yourself. But it also leads to some groups of
people getting defined by stereotypes associated with aggression, which causes
people to treat them as less than human. If I
say the word thug, that picture in your head that
comes up. Yep, that's what I'm talking about. That it's
not cool, So let's talk about it. When can aggression
(10:04):
be healthy? When is it really a problem? How can
you live a life? We're not afraid of your own
aggression or someone else's. Okay, we can't get too far
into that last one. We only have another forty minutes
of showtime, but we'll at least get started. Do you
have a story you think it would be good for
the show? Are you interested in sponsoring the show? Leanna
atnthapyshow dot com. That is my email. Not therapyshow dot
(10:25):
com is the website at not Therapy Show on social media.
We'll be back after this talking aggression. It's not always bad,
but what happens when it is on? It's not therapy.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot c.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or text two to one one
or go to two one one dot cack and it's
not therapist. Still the inn occurson, I'm still not a therapist.
We're still talking about aggression, when it's healthy, when it's not,
(11:06):
and when it's time to consider seeking help for unhealthy
or destructive aggressive tendencies. You know, Hulks Smash is fun
to watch in a movie, but that's because it's just
a movie. I've seen too many people destroy their lives
because they're just too aggressive. And that's you know, either
(11:28):
they're aggressive too frequently or more likely because they tend
to explode just you know, too much. Just something is
relatively small and maybe they didn't respond badly three days ago,
but they did this, and you know, volcano, Just what's
(11:48):
going on. It's scary, right, And I haven't found these
people to be angry. They don't say they're enraged. They
get very upset when you say that they're angry. No,
a lot of times they're frightened. It's undeniable, though, that
(12:09):
volcano behavior is a problem, and they realize it too late,
if they realize it at all. And I'm just not
talking about men, to be clear, this isn't just a
man thing. I've seen my fair share of women who
just don't know how to engage with other people without
being a victim or victimizer. So if you imagine this
(12:30):
like victim bar it just all the stuff that makes
someone feel bad. It just builds up and builds up
and builds up and Finally, when that meter gets full,
they just explode. And because the person who got exploded
on isn't aware of everything else that filled that meter,
they're just like, what's going on? You know what? I
(12:52):
don't care. I'm just gonna go. And when those explosions happen,
the person who exploded, it's always someone else's fault, right,
Always someone made them. They made me. I had my reasons.
I'm defending myself, I'm fighting back, I'm punching up, except
(13:13):
you're not. You know, individual mileage varies. I can't know
what's going on in every individual person's head. But from
the outside, hate to break it to y'all, it was
something really quite minor and it turned into a massive
thing because of an inability to self soothe. And you know,
(13:35):
because you're being so aggressive with yourself, your self talk
is so brutal, then any slight, sometimes very small, on
a bad day, is a potential catalyst for a gigantic
meltdown because you are constantly under pressure and it doesn't
(13:59):
happen to be this way. These things really are choices,
and people hate it when I say that, but it's true.
I went through this myself. Often people who are in
this state, you know, intermittent explosive. Right, they're enabled by
the people around them. That doesn't mean the people around
(14:20):
them say they like the explosions, but they may get upset,
but they still play the game. Right. These explosive people
learned fairly early on that the most effective way to
get what they wanted in the short term was to
have a tantrum. Even if the people around the person
(14:41):
with that aggression issue clearly didn't like the tantrums, they
gave in to them. And you know, I say tantrum
because these things start in childhood, right. A kid realizes
that meltdowns get them attention from parents in a way
that good behavior doesn't. Even negative attention can sometimes be
(15:02):
preferable to outright neglect. And if good behavior is just
expected and therefore not rewarded, and bad behavior is, well,
that gets somebody to pay attention, even though it's punishment,
it's better than neglect. You'll often hear people like this
(15:24):
who have these bad tempers. They'll say it's just the
way I am, or it's just my personality, and this
is incorrect. Personality is one thing, your behaviors are another.
And self acceptance is a great thing, which is what
it's just the way I am is faking. And I
(15:47):
say faking because you know, if you're blowing up on people,
it's just my personality isn't acceptable, it's behavior, right. We
try to understand our personalities precisely so we can work
with them instead of against them. And it's been my
experience that the most aggressive people I've ever met are
also the least self aware people I've ever met. They're
(16:11):
so busy responding to perceived or imagine threats that they
don't do very much looking inward or looking forward, because
the last thing they'd admit to anybody is that they're terrified,
and they're so worried about getting found out, they're not
thinking through the predictable consequences of those ragers, and you know,
(16:38):
stopping thinking it through, realizing that these things are choices,
that behavior is not personality. That's what I had to
do to tame my own PTSD related aggression. I had
to admit that the thing at the core of it
was terror, and that meant facing that terror. And sorry
(17:01):
if this freaks out anybody, but unfortunately a lot of
the things I was terrified of actually did happen. You
know that fear of abandonment. It it was a reasonable fear.
People really didn't like it when I set boundaries, and
they attacked me when I said no to things, you know,
(17:21):
quietly at least in a regular, moderated voice, but firmly.
I didn't match their energy. And it's weird because some
people respond better to just getting in their face and
calling them names right back, and they can't handle it
when you just go no, I'm not accepting you calling
me that. Please stop. When you do that, they blame
(17:47):
you for everything. It is an onslaught. They retaliate. You know,
I lost jobs. I definitely lost friends, if you can
call them friends. Even some family stop speaking to me
just because I said no. And you know what, on
the bride side, I wasn't paranoid. Oh that really bed's tough.
(18:10):
Was gonna happen on the not so bright side, yikes.
To put this in perspective, I spent years, you know,
I started therapy when I was fifteen years old, and
I warned therapists like, if I do what you are
asking me to do, it's not gonna go well. And
(18:30):
they looked at me with this condescending smile and just
just try it, they'll understand. And no, no, they didn't understand. No,
And that therapist was not there to handle the fallout
(18:51):
of how much they absolutely did not understand. And people
can nitpick all they want, you know, oh you did
it wrong, or oh you didn't do it at the
right time, or all that stuff, that doesn't matter when
someone takes a step into terror and exactly the thing
(19:12):
they were afraid of, and they were assured by a therapist,
oh no, trust me, it won't happen, it happens. But
despite all of that, despite how badly it went, the
reality is I just couldn't live in that dog eat
dog world anymore. That that aggression, that being the biggest,
(19:33):
baddest dog in the yard just so people wouldn't attack me.
Not only wasn't was it not healthy for anyone, It
wasn't me, It wasn't actually my personality. I didn't enjoy that.
It didn't feel good being terrified all the time, just
warm me out. And yeah, it was really hard to
(19:54):
face the fact that a lot of people were just
using me, that they really did love me, and I
couldn't force them to because they weren't really capable of love.
You know I had to accept I was never gonna
be that beloved and cherished person that was. You know,
I was gonna prove my parents wrong about all the horrible,
(20:17):
cruel labels they put on me in childhood. I was
never gonna be that beautiful person. I was just me,
just me, plain, all average, not at all special, kind
of to extremely annoying, absolutely strange and yet completely unremarkable
(20:38):
at the same time. Me. Yeah, maybe I would amount
to nothing. Maybe everybody was always gonna leave me, No
one was ever gonna like me. I was inherently unlikable.
Maybe I was gonna die alone and in poverty. Maybe
all of these terrors were absolutely true. You know they
they probably are true. Canadian media paid as I crap,
(21:00):
and our pension system, you know, it likely won't be
solvent by the time I hit retirement age. If I
make it to retirement age, which is in question based
on some of the medical conditions I have, you know,
I might be on the medically assisted dying plan in
max twenty years. Now, does any of this give me
the right to lash out at other people? No, not
(21:24):
a single thing I just said gives me the right
to lash out at other people. I'm entitled to my feelings.
I'm not entitled to have those feelings be an excuse
to dump on others. And that's it. It is really
(21:44):
that simple, the awareness that no matter what people do
to me, it does not give me the right to
hurt others. If you deny yourself the permission structure for
unhealthy aggression and rage, it is amazing how quickly it stops. Now.
(22:09):
The downside is you have to deal with all the
other feelings, right the pain, the fear, the sadness, the
loneliness that that aggression is containing and burning act so
you don't have to feel it. But you know, is
(22:31):
hurting other people is of waiting hurting yourself worth that
that's a question I couldn't say yes to. Of course,
you know that doesn't mean allowing other people to treat
you like a doormat. Like I said, it's amazing how
people can't handle a simple no. But you know, I
(22:53):
learned to get a lot more okay with other people's rage.
I mean, I'm never gonna like it. Some people are
really scary. But what I have learned is to not
blame myself for it. And that's precisely because hey, I
learned to recognize that I'm responsible for me, other people
(23:15):
are responsible for them, and I've had the same aggressive
impulses and learn to channel it into better. There's no excuse,
and the minute you stop making excuses is the minute
things start getting better. Now, I'm fortunate to deal with
(23:35):
mental health stuff, you know, I've learned a lot from
working with and even being friends with people with borderline
personality disorder. Now, I'm not trying to say all people
with borderline personality disorder are like this, but fair warning,
a lot of these friendships you attempt, even if you
do your absolute best, these friendships do not last. That's
(23:58):
a marker of the condition. Now, BPD rage is something
that we know about and we have studied, and that's
why it's useful. It is the extreme of a continuum
of human experience. We all feel these things, we all
(24:19):
sometimes do these things to a degree, but it's so
strong in people with conditions like you know, borderline personality disorder.
That's not the only condition, ADHD, bipolar disorder, narcissism, I've
already mentioned PTSD, dementia, psychosis, substance use and abuse, traumatic
(24:39):
brain injuries. All of these conditions increase the likelihood of
unhealthy aggressive behavior, not across the board. I said increase
the likelihood, not guarantee. Okay. The thing about studying people
who are sort of certified, yeah this isn't healthy is
things are so big that you can take them. It's
(25:02):
crystal clear, and you could apply them to your own stuff. Now, yeah, okay,
people can't help a traumatic brain injury. But environment is
a huge factor as well. That's why No. Two people
with ADHD or are like. No, two people with BPD
are like. Environment matters incredibly, right. If you're raised to
(25:27):
believe that hostility and aggression might not be liked, but
it is tolerated and enabled, well you're more likely to
think that's normal, and you're more likely to be hostile yourself,
even if you hate the person who bullied you as
a kid. Right, The point is they got away with it.
It worked. They were strong. You were weak. That's the
(25:48):
lesson you walked away with. But bullies aren't strong. No.
On the contrary, bullies are some of the most internally
weak people out there. That's why they bully. And the
thing about narcissistic personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, they are
defined by, you know, a lacking or unstable inner sense
(26:13):
of self, like core self. And that's one of the theories
about why the aggression, why the rage gets so bad.
But the tragedy of people with BPD. Unlike narcissists, who
is always it's the world, nothing's ever their fault, people
with BPD don't. It's not so neat for them, right,
(26:36):
they end up raging against themselves. You watch them do it,
and they don't realize it. Right. When we think of rage,
we think of an angry, out of control, just smashing
up stuff person right, but a borderline personality black split.
It's a phenomenon where a person with BPD suddenly thinks
(26:57):
someone is all bad or a threat that starts off
as sort of you know the phrase cope and seed. Well,
it's like a seed with no cope. You know. The
person may start off seeming open to conversation and they are.
They're trying, right, but absolutely no boundary you set is
(27:21):
capable of being respected when they're in that state, because
you know, in their mind you're evil and you're out
to get them. And if they can't pull themselves out
of that disordered thinking rooted in fear, because things. Think
about it, They're out to get me is a pretty
classic fear statement, you know, And sometimes that fear is
something as simple as they're afraid they made a mistake,
(27:43):
because if they made a mistake, well, then the person's
gonna be angry at them. And if the person's gonna
be angry at them, then they're gonna leave. And that
is the big fear in borderline personality disorder, a big
fear of abandonment, and the tragedy is that the person
with BPD ends up blowing up or running away, usually
(28:06):
both right, only to come back and then accuse you
of a bunch of stuff that you have no point
of reference for a little bit later. And you know,
professionals say you're supposed to validate their feelings, but I've
honestly found that, you know, three out of five times
that just results in more rage because you're patronizing me,
(28:28):
and usually things break down because you set boundaries. They
don't respect them. They don't see anything wrong with that
because in their minds, you hurt them, and they feel threatened.
They need to protect themselves, which usually involves lashing out
and causing hurt themselves. And if you lost the plot
between somebody with borderline personality disorder and regular conversations you
(28:49):
have with your family. Well, you know, somebody in your
family might have BPD, but more likely we live in
an age of unchecked aggression. We live in an age
it's you know, not me, it's you and you made me.
And it's utterly tragic. Precisely for that reason, because you know,
(29:15):
we've studied and documented people with borderline personality desord. They
bear that stigma, but we see that kind of behavior
all the time, and it's important to keep in mind.
We are all capable under stress to greater or lesser degrees,
(29:38):
depending on the person of that sort of extremely disordered thinking.
Someone who you thought was great one minute is suddenly
out to get you the next. Right, none of us
is perfect regarding recognizing our own emotional states, but it's
worth working on it. And here's why. Okay, if we
(30:01):
can't effectively recognize our own feelings, nobody's going to be perfect.
But if we're not reasonably good at it, we're gonna
be absolutely lousy at reading and understanding somebody else's We
treat people with diagnosed conditions as being unable to help themselves,
but that's not true. Treatments exist, and you know, as
(30:27):
I talked about before, the techniques aren't complicated. It's just
terrifying to take that plunge and fall into the abyss
and be consumed by fear and sadness and loneliness and yeah,
a great deal of blame and shame, but you can
(30:48):
come out the other end. And someone like me with PTSD,
someone with BPD, if you take your treatments seriously, you know,
we're better at managing our emotions. And someone with no
formal diagnosis who treats every thought they have as absolute
fact and then acts without any further thought. Right, saying
(31:12):
they can't help it or they're doing their best is
enabling them and frankly, treating them like children. If you've
got one person in your family or friend group that
is allowed to just get away with anything because that's
just the way they are, that textbook enabling, you're not
being fair to the other people who don't behave that way.
(31:36):
And while that person who's behaving badly again, notice I'm
saying behaving badly not is a bad person. They might
have horrible things done to them, but I guarantee you
there's at least one other person in that group that
has seen some issh too and not behaved like that. Yes,
they can help it, and many people with these conditions
(32:00):
do help it. Not only are the oh they can't
help it excuses not helping these people. Enabling is harm.
It is now. While aggression obviously can have negative consequences,
there is a time and a place for it. It's wired
(32:22):
into us for a reason. So we're gonna turn the
page talk about that after the break. Questions, comments, concerns
Leanna at not therapyshow dot com. Not therapyshow dot com
is the website at not Therapy Show on social media
aggression where it fits in our lives in a productive way.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
After this break, No Radio, No Problem stream is live
on SAGA ninety six am dot C.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or text two one one or
go to two one one dot CA. Well back in
the South therapy, I'm still in a cursoner. I'm still
not a therapist. We're still talking about aggression. Now we've
(33:10):
gone the negatives of it, but you know, it's wired
into our humanity for a reason. And I'm going to
give you a personal background on where aggression was helpful
right in control, like Animal in Control. That was a
good movie. When I was a video game journalist instead
of a mental health reporter, there were these big trade
(33:32):
shows for video games. They were like E three, which
is not around anymore, Penny Arcade Expo. You might have
heard his packs, right, And I'd go to those two
well report on stuff. And every single year, EA otherwise
known as Electronic Arts big video game publisher for those
who don't know. Okay, every year, no matter what outlet
(33:55):
I was looking for, EA would lose my appointment. It
was a apparently a thing they were known to do
to Canadian media because forget Canada, We're seen as America's
hat by the video game ministry. You Besoft back in
the day that has multiple studios in Canada. A lot
(34:16):
of Ubisoft games come out of Canada, but they didn't
even have their own check in desk at the UBI
Saft booth. It was US Europe. You don't, I forget Asia,
No Canada. Mexico had its own check in, but not Canada, right,
I guess cause the language, right, but what you'd have
to do at the Ubisoft booth is you'd have to
sort of ask around to find one of the Canadian
(34:37):
PR people who did at least have your appointment.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
They acknowledge, they knew you were coming, so ubisof was chaos,
but they weren't just the absolute rerickery.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
That's not the word I wanted to say that Sea Right,
an Act division, another big publisher, Wow, Okay, Activision deliberately
overbooked their demos, kind of like overbooking a flight. So
just because you had an appointment for a playable demo
didn't mean you'd actually get to play. And you can
(35:14):
imagine how they treated a girl as a less legitimate
player than the guys there. So guess who often got told, well,
you can watch over someone's shoulder, which is not the
same as playing. In an environment like this, you sometimes
(35:35):
have to get aggressive. You have to do it in
a calculated way, but there's no avoiding it. And the
crews that were with me were sometimes they found it
funny how I would literally put my foot in a
door and refuse to leave until I got access, because
that's not really me day to day. I'm pretty you know, Okay,
(35:55):
you know, I don't want to get anybody's face. But
if you're not at least a aggressive as a reporter,
you don't get anywhere. You're lousy at the job. You
do have to challenge people, you know, there's a great
scene in the Superman movie where you know, Lois Lane
Lark can't goes oh you can interview me, and all
(36:16):
of a sudden she's a reporter instead of his girlfriend,
and he can't take it. Sometimes you have to get aggressive.
There are plenty of pr people who delight in stonewalling,
and you know, obviously companies like to cover up the
less good stuff. Governments, yeah, absolutely, But there's also the
(36:38):
other angle to the story where if you just you know,
lose yourself in empathy. Oh, this is such a horrible
story this person is telling, you may get taken for
a ride. You know, you have to sniff out deception
as well. And then of course there's a reality of
the online cesspool of people who cannot take any any critique,
(37:03):
any questioning of the things they like, or any praise
of the things they don't like. Just last week I
had people insulting me because I wouldn't agree that the
Superman movie is a lecture on US immigration policy. This
was before the movie was out, and again I've seen
it twice. It's not It is not a lecture on
(37:24):
US immigration policy. Thank you, Kelly and Conway. The word
immigrant doesn't appear in the movie. Once some reporters inferred
the connection. It's inferred, it's not even implied. It was
their own stuff they put in because Superman is an alien.
(37:46):
But the thing is Superman is literally an alien from
the planet Krypton. That's not a term applied to another
human from another country. And yeah, I'm being a little
aggressive here, partially for comedic effect. But if you don't
(38:06):
have the ability to push back on this, I'm gonna
say it nonsense. You're not gonna get very far in
fact based media. And it's extra hard for women to
do this because men, let's just face it, guys, I
defend you a lot, but you're given greater license to
be aggressive than women are by society. And yeah, there's
(38:29):
a clap back to that, there's a downside, but still,
women are much more likely to be called crazy when
we get angry, especially if we respond to that anger aggressively,
which is why so many women say I'm upset instead
of I'm angry, and that's something I'm trying to train
(38:49):
myself out of. Because no, the politically driven misrepresentation of
a movie about a guy who wears his underwear on
the outside and prominently features a flying dog that is
angering precisely because it's utterly ridiculous to do in the
first place, and it's just intended to destroy fun. Now
(39:10):
it's even harder for people like me to show any
aggression whatsoever because I've got one of those diagnoses associated
with bad aggression. Aggression is a symptom you crazy, right.
I had a PTSD diagnosis in twenty thirteen, and some
people say, well, that was, you know, twelve years ago.
Does that count now? Individual mileage may vary, right, Yeah,
(39:35):
Aggression is a symptom of PTSD sometimes. I talked about
that earlier on the show. But aggression is also something
humans just do, and this is not an exaggeration. I
get dismissed as crazy by someone on almost a daily basis.
And the thing is, I'm probably mentally healthier than these
(39:58):
people calling me c because you know, I went through
it before. I've actually faced my issues. I also worked
in stand up comedy and stand up comics sometimes have
to get aggressive with a heckler. I remember there was
one thing where people are throwing ice at us at
a show, and I don't remember it with Calgary Edmondon
that one, but I finally just pulled up, I'm gonna
(40:19):
lean into this and did you know if one more
person throws that ice, I'm going to come down that
crowd and I'm gonna rip your bleep and bleep bleep bleep. Right,
And it was for a fact, but the ice throwing
stopped good story that one. It can be more serious. Right,
Let's talk about police. Right. Police have to find the
(40:45):
line daily between using enough aggression to maintain order and
solve crimes, to ram all that paperwork through the system
right in a timely manner, without being so aggressive that
you violate someone's rights. And anybody who thinks that's easy
needs to walk a mile and a cop shoes because
(41:09):
you'll get spit on, you know. I found that when
I tried to avoid absolutely all aggression because I was
so I was so beaten down being called crazy when
I was working my butt off every day to be
good crazy instead of bad crazy. When I tried to
deny myself any aggression, any anger, I was more likely
(41:29):
to blow up because feelings you don't feel get bigger.
When I was gentler to myself and gave myself the
affirming message that it's okay to get angry. Sometimes it's
okay to get aggressive, just make sure you're still in control,
that you can stop if someone's going WHOA, slow down?
Hang on? You know. When that became the message it's
(41:53):
okay to be aggressive as long as you're in control,
my emotional regulation improved a lot, because, hey, sometimes real talk,
a situation is untenable and you have to be aggressive,
you know. Extreme example, if someone's beating on a kid
or screaming at a kid, you have the right to
get aggressive to protect that child because that child cannot
(42:16):
protect themselves. That's way different than insulting a waiter because
the kitchen got your order wrong. Right? So, how do
we feel anger without losing control? How do we feel
aggression and keep it in bounced? I'll get to that
after our final break. Questions, comments, any feedback whatsoever? Leanna
at Nontherapyshow dot com, not Therapyshow dot com at not
(42:37):
Therapy Show on social media. When we come back, aggression,
How do we keep it in bounds?
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Stream us live at SAGA nine six am dot C.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
The following program is a peer to peer advice show
and does not diagnose mental health conditions. If you're seeking
social services, please call or Tech two one one or
go to two one one dot CA. We're back in
a Stoll therapy. I'm still in an a cursor. I'm
still not a therapist. You've got a few minutes left
and we're still talking about aggression, and it's the last
(43:14):
segment of the program. So I'm gonna give you some
stuff to do. Right, How are we aggressive in a
healthy way instead of that unhealthier relationship destroying, possibly get
arrested kind of way. Right, Well, there's a really simple
thing you can do. It's called the ninety second rule.
And basically this is something I actually read about. There's
(43:36):
I forget his name right now, but there's an expert
that preaches this. He had an article in CNBC recently.
But I was doing it myself without realizing that somebody
else had, you know, put their name on it first.
I take more than ninety seconds, but this guy says
ninety seconds just when you're feeling something strong take ninety
seconds to just feel it. I don't time it. That
(43:58):
might help you. My version is just like I'm angry,
I'm angry, I'm angry, and you keep just repeating that
to yourself until you feel it EBB. Same with I'm sad,
same with I'm lonely. Just give yourself time to feel
that feeling. Because what you don't want to get into
(44:21):
is that blind spot. Right. Fear can blind us to things,
Anger can blind us to things, right Sadness can even
blind us to things, And when that translates into aggression,
it's doing that because it's blinding us to the fact
that the other person is a person. So I find
(44:45):
that even if you're still upset, if you got to
deal with something when you're off balance, balancing aggression with
empathy is a great way to stop yourself from going overboard.
Putting yourself in the other person shoes and giving benefit
of the doubt is extremely helpful. Not only does it
(45:06):
control your reactions, and hey, I wouldn't like that if
somebody did that to me, so I'm not going to
do it to them. You know, not only does it
control your behavior, it actually reduces your anger. It reduces
rumination that spinning it again and again. I can't believe
you did that anymy, right, it reduces that by channeling
(45:26):
your thoughts in a different direction, right, instead of thinking
of all the ways your enemies are plotting against you,
it helps you realize that, like, look, do you spend
huge amounts of time plotting against other people? If you
do seek help? Maybe no, really that is you need therapy, territory.
(45:48):
This program cannot help you here. But you know, if
you don't regularly spend time thinking about how to you know,
go full ConA and lamentations for women on your enemies,
realize that regulated people usually don't have the time or
(46:10):
energy for that. If you truly believe that person is
plotting against you, the best thing to do is get
far far away. But even in instances like that, ramping
yourself up for a conflict just makes it more likely
that you will have a hair trigger and you'll go off.
And if somebody is plotting against you, that's exactly what
(46:31):
they want, you know, But it's usually better to go no,
you know what, that person, there's probably just a misunderstanding here.
We can work it out. And even if we can't,
I didn't do anything really horribly wrong here. So my
(46:52):
behavior is about me, their behavior is about them. They
could still push your buttons and if you get a
little hot, but that's okay because again you know they're
pushing your buttons to hurt you, and you know that's
a sign that this is a person that you may
want to spend less time with in future. Right, if
(47:15):
you go into anything with a more confident center, you know,
go in going I'm going to do my best and
I deserve to be here, and this can be a
win win for everybody. But I can only control my part.
Other people have to control them. Top ten Price. Don't
(47:37):
let problems and not your fault, lead to mistakes that
are right. Aggression meets balance. Aggressively pursue your goals. Don't
use aggression to mask fear. Feel your fear instead, feel
your insecurities and tell yourself it's okay. Nobody's perfect. You're
(47:58):
working on it right, and that's all you can do.
It may seem terrifying to contemplate if you were raised
in a home where correction was harsh, but trust me
as someone who's been through it, it's better. And I
am out of time. I better wrap questions, comments, concerns.
Leanna at nottherapyshow dot com. Not therapyshow dot com is
(48:18):
the website at not therapy on social media. Running out
of time You're crazy is only a problem if it's
hurting you. See you next time. Go see Superman.
Speaker 1 (48:30):
No Radio, no problem. Stream is live on SAGA ninety
six am dot co
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