Category Archives: Yoga

Being with People Who Love Anger

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I don’t like to be angry. I don’t like to be around anger or to witness fights. But, I know that my feelings about that aren’t the same as some folks. Some people, as far as I can tell, enjoy being angry and enjoy fighting.

These people may not say that they enjoy it, but the fact that they continually look for a reason to be angry, fight at the slightest provocation, and will turn even a happy occurrence into a reason to feel slighted, suggests that they do. Maybe it’s the adrenaline rush of the drama. Maybe it has something to do with endorphins and dopamine. I don’t know.

Dealing with people who love conflict is difficult if you find conflict and drama to be challenging, sad, or anxiety-producing. And, when the people are the kind of individuals that will even kick a gift horse in the knees, it’s troubling.

I’ve been working on how to manage these folks in my own life, since I do not enjoy drama, and I have a few strategies that I’m trying.

  • I’m really working to remember that the need to be angry is theirs. It is not about me. I don’t need to feel attacked. I just need to keep in mind that it’s not about what I did or didn’t do or how I failed. They would be mad regardless.
  • I’m trying to keep in mind that these people are lovable and wonderful, even when it seems that they struggle to find anything lovable and wonderful in anything or anyone else.
  • I do what I can to walk away from the situations where someone is being like that. It doesn’t always work (in recent weeks, I’ve gotten angry emails that are focused on my unwillingness to engage in the fight). Sometimes, that means I lose the opportunity to note the good things, but when it’s really creating a problem for me, it’s best to remove myself.
  • I aim to stay calm myself. It does not always work. At times, I can stay calm in the moment and then come home and release a torrent of frustration on my poor spouse. This isn’t the best. I’m working on it.
  • I (and this one is a struggle) am pondering ways to keep from letting others make me more and more upset at the hostile angry people. Even the drama of what seems to be righteous anger is not healthy for me.
  • I get to as many yoga classes or home sessions as I can at times when the drama cycle seems particularly intense. Yoga helps me to find what is calm in myself in the midst of the swirl.

Do you love drama, or are you a less-drama-please kind of person? Does anger make you feel powerful or distressed? How do you deal with the anger-lovers in your world? I would love any tips you have!

Everywhere and Nowhere at All

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About a decade and a half ago, there was a collective “woohoo” about how computers were going to revolutionize work life, particularly for mothers, because they would allow women to work from home, while still maintaining their family obligations. Everyone was very excited about the flexibility this offered and how it would help women attain greater work success without feeling that they were mothering poorly. And then, after some time, the research on this started being published and it didn’t seem to correlate with the hoped for idea. What most studies suggested was that women were not more happy and fulfilled, but less happy and fulfilled, and that they believed both their work and their family lives were suffering.

Why would that be the case? It seems that it was/is because, when they were tele- cyber-commuting, women felt that they were never really  home and never really at work. Home tasks and conversations were interrupted by work obligations. Work tasks and obligations were interrupted by home chores and interactions. The attempt to multi-task resulted in a sense that no task was being completed satisfactorily.

We know this in some sense. I think we have all had the experience of thinking we could read an article while watching TV and realizing after a while that we didn’t know what was happening on the show or in the article. Or, we’ve tried to make the pancakes and finish those emails and ended up with burnt pancakes and half-done correspondence. Tell me this isn’t just me.

We think we can save time by doing multiple things at one time, but it really just ends up using  up extra time and creating frustration, and it prevents us from being truly mindful about any of the things we are doing.

One of the advantages of yoga is that it helps encourage focus. It’s very hard to think about what to make for dinner when you are busy trying to figure out how to put your left foot into your hip crease and balance on your hands. It’s not a benefit I thought I would get from yoga, but it has turned out to be one of the most important things I have received.

Now, I don’t want to overstate this. I can’t lie. At this moment there are six tabs open on my browser. So, I still can get pulled into multi-tasking very easily. But, I would say that I’m at least more aware of that happening, and I don’t fool myself into thinking that I am getting or giving the very best.

 

Cruel to be Kind

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We have spent some time this month talking about kindness at Yogawood. This has arisen from the theme of the month, drawn from a sloka from the Bhagavad Gita, which reads:

samniyama-indriya-gramam / sarvatra sama-buddhayah
te prapnuvanti mam eva / sarva-bhuta-hite ratah
Those who are able to control their senses, have equanimity of mind and rejoice in contributing to the welfare of all creatures are dear to me.
Bhagavad Gita XII.4

As we talked about this, my teacher, Beth, noted that kind and nice are not the same, and it reminded me of how often I think about this in my yoga practice, and in my life.

Being nice is often easy, but being kind is more complicated, because the kindest thing to do for another being may well not be the nicest. This holds true for the small moments in life (Does this eyeshadow look ok? Do I have to eat my vegetables?) and the major decisions (Should I quit my job to follow the band?), and everything in between. Sometimes, what we need from another, or even from the self that is the voice in our own heads, is to be told that the nice choice is the wrong choice.

This comes up often in parenting. There are so many times when it would be nice to give in, but that isn’t the kindest choice. It comes up in managing others, when you see bad options or behavior and have to ‘be mean’ and shut it down. It comes up in asana practice when bed is warm but you should go to class, or it would feel nice to take an hour long asana, but it isn’t the best choice.

Photo by Deb Roby on Flickr

Photo by Deb Roby on Flickr

When it’s not possible to be kind and nice, we can still strive for kind.