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Archive for the ‘emotions’ Category

Anger

August 31, 2021

Shake a can of Coke or beer. Hand it to someone at a picnic. Watch and laugh as they pop it open and are sprayed as the contents spew forth. Adolescent practical joke usually perpetrated by 20-something men. Metaphor for anger.

Sometimes we hold anger inside. And it gurgles, and bubbles, and ferments, and builds pressure.

Until…

It must explode either in acts of verbal or physical violence or your body gives way with a stroke or heart attack.

Sometimes just a perceived slight from someone can build and build until inner peace is destroyed.

We must deal with this. There must be a safe outlet. But first we must recognize its presence. Then its cause. A good reason why Jesus told us to go make things right with the other person before offering a gift to God. John Climacus taught us anger is a disturbance of the heart that prevents the presence of the Spirit.

More than breathing exercises, which may help bring down the boiling point, we must also search for humility and then reconciliation in order to return to stability.

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Running From and To

July 29, 2021

We often run toward solitude and away from people when our soul suffers provocation. Rather than confront and resolve, we run and hide. We wallow in self-pity fanning the flames of anger, jealousy.

When our soul is stirred by lust, rather than flee we run to groups of people. Perhaps we seek the solace of another body or encouragement in the pursuit of that which we lust for.

Famous people have observed that we are drawn to do that which we know we don’t want to do or don’t do that which we know we should.

How much better to run toward reconciliation to quell harsh emotions and to flee quickly that which draws us into doing what we know harms us.

[Thoughts upon reading from Evagrius Ponticus, The Praktikos.]

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Speaking Your Mind

March 4, 2021

Saying whatever comes to mind without an interposing filter–describes every two-year-old everywhere.

Also most sixteen-year-olds who have learned much, but whose brains are not yet fully developed.

I knew a person who would often find trouble with the bosses by always “speaking the truth.” Unfortunately, that version of the truth was always negative, tearing down the reputation of companies and people.

Many people today wan to say whatever they want (true or not) whenever they wish without regard for consequences. If perpetuating lies forwards my perceived best interests, then fine.

These feelings are not modern.

The Apostle James wrote in the first Century about the dangers of speaking without thinking. The tongue, he said, is a tiny organ that can cause great trouble.

Saint Gregory of Nyssa said, “Divinity is purity, it is liberation from the passions and the removal of every evil: if all these things are in you, God is truly in you.”

He also said [pronouns changed to include us all], “You must always examine your own thoughts, your own words, and your own actions in the innermost depths to see whether they are oriented to Christ or are drifting away from him.”

I like those words “oriented” and “drifting away.” I could probably write an entire book just on the meaning of those.

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More and More Useless Information

February 4, 2021

When I’m drivin’ in my car, and the man comes on the radio
He’s tellin’ me more and more about some useless information
Supposed to fire my imagination.
I can’t get no, oh no no no, hey, hey, hey
That’s what I say
I can’t get no satisfaction, I can’t get no satisfaction. –Rolling Stones

It was 1965. I was 17 sitting in a pub across the street from the University of Cincinnati campus. Upstairs was a big room with wooden picnic tables for the patrons. Bunch of nerdy guys. We sang out to “I can’t get no” and “Hey, you, get off of my cloud…two’s a crowd.”

We grew up. But some of us Boomers tried to overthrow the government. We’re still living the Stones of our youth. And we’ve become more and more gullible about the man on the radio (TV, Internet now) telling us more and more about some useless information.

Pick your poison, as they used to say in the movies. You can find your favorite flavor of poison without looking very hard.

It is so important to discern what to fill your mind with. It can feed my base emotions and desires for individual satisfaction. It can feed my mind with the kind of satisfaction that only comes from living in the spirit.

Writers for millennia have described the problem and the consequences. Take the story of Rehoboam in the Hebrew Bible, grandson of the famous King David. This happened almost 3,000 years ago. He was just about to be anointed King. He had two groups of advisors. He rejected the wise and listened to his young friends who filled his mind with more and more of some useless information.

On the day of what should have been his greatest satisfaction, he lost most of the Kingdom. What took his grandfather and father years to build, he destroyed in a day. He was seeking satisfaction.

Posted in emotions, Ethics, Wisdom | Leave a Comment »

Don’t Be A Slave To Emotions

December 8, 2020

Seven Things Mindful People Do:

Practicebeingcurious
Forgive themselves
Hold their emotions lightly
Practice compassion
Make peace with imperfection
Embrace vulnerability
Understand all things come and go

That moment is seared in my memory. That last time I succumbed entirely to an emotion that I allowed to completely rule over me. No amount of analysis assuages the memory of the anger and words that just came out without thought or consideration. I was instantly humiliated by the action.

Developmental psychologists have long been able to trace how we humans can progress to completely inside ourselves to the level of maturity of considering ourselves and others together. However, our news sources would dry up to a trickle of good news without the number of people acting out emotions on public stages.

As a Jesus-follower, I constantly learn how he modeled handling emotions, yet honoring them. He knew sorrow and anger, and yet channeled them in a beneficial way.

Twice yesterday I was presented with a method for mindfully handling strong emotions that could have the power (if I let them) to take over lives with sometimes devastating results. It’s called RAIN.

R=recognize (the first step of every growth pattern is awareness)

A=allow (don’t try to bury it, let it sit, recognized, realize it is a part of me)

I=investigate (what triggered it, why am I reacting)

N=non-identification (“I have this emotion, but I am not this emotion”)

[I should have mentioned yesterday, as well, that sometimes we can’t handle these things ourselves. When that happens, we need to recognize the situation and seek help from a professional.]

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The Heart Is Deceitful

November 10, 2020

Yesterday I looked at advice for you to set your heart in the right direction.

But we must beware and be aware–as the ancient Hebrew prophet Jeremiah noted, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.”

Prophecy in the scriptures does not equal telling the future. It does equal bringing a message from God that speaks to the times–and sometimes to all times. Perhaps here we first meet God the Cardiologist. Jeremiah quotes The Lord, “I the Lord search the heart and examine the mind, to reward each person according to their conduct, according to what their deeds deserve.”

Sometimes we may look at ourselves and think how beautiful we look when indeed it is vanity talking.

Sometimes we consider ourselves and judge ourself as a “good Christian” when indeed God (and other people) look at our conduct and deeds and judge us as wanting.

We can overcome that deceitful heart. But only by working on the machine that is us and becoming brutally self-aware.

We realize at some point in our lives, hopefully sooner than later, that no matter what that inner voice tells us that when we mentally and spiritually take a step back and look at ourselves as God and others truly see us that we are lacking. We fall short of how smart we think we are, or how wise we think we are, or how much a servant we think we are.

It’s not pure theory or pure knowledge that God is searching us for. How did we treat the server at the restaurant or barista at the coffee shop? How did we treat the least of the people we met?

Will God search us and find us not worthy?

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Beware Smoldering Resentment

March 3, 2020

I confess, I have an addiction—to British murder mysteries on TV. I am grateful for Amazon Prime and BritBox 😉

A well written murder mystery probes into some of the darkness of emotions. In an old episode of Midsomer Murders, the writers probed the shouldering (guess I should use British spelling) resentment that two women had for their mothers. Both of the mothers had a deviant sexual side that affected the daughters for different reasons—but with the same effect, namely murder.

As we meditate and work on our own self-awareness, these smoldering emotions perhaps lying below consciousness but very real nonetheless can erupt much like a volcano with smoldering lava deep inside. These forces that can, with a subtle shift of rock and pressure, spew out destruction.

Often people outside us can detect deep-seated resentment in us. There is a stare of intensity, quickness to anger, inability to relate to others.

Check on your own state. Quench the smoldering embers within. Work on gratitude, forgiveness (for yourself as well as others), accepting grace.

Posted in Awareness, Disciplines, emotions | Leave a Comment »

The Heart App

January 28, 2019

It’s not an obsession. No, really, it isn’t. But I do check my Health app several times a day to see how many miles/steps/flights I have moved.

The icon for the app on my iPhone is a white background with a red heart.

So, I was wondering. Wouldn’t it be great to have a heart app for my spiritual heart?

After all, Jesus was most interested in the state of the heart of people he encountered.

Maybe you’d get a haptic jolt if your heart was tending toward anger, hate, jealousy, bitterness, and the like.

Maybe you’d get a gentle approving buzz if your heart was empathetic, joyful, loving.

Instead of “FitBit” it could be “SoulBit”?

Instead of telling me to get up and walk (which is a good thing), it would tell me to think of someone and offer a prayer wishing them well. Or to take a deep breath, calm down, leave the hurtful emotions behind.

Maybe it’s time for me to learn Swift and rekindle my programming skills?

Or just learn Jesus words and rekindle my “heart” skills?

How about you?

Posted in Disciplines, emotions | 1 Comment »

Remembrance of Wrongs

June 22, 2018

Do you carry grudges? Do you dwell on past hurts? The times someone metaphorically stabbed you in the back? When someone promised and didn’t fulfill or broke a contract?

We’ve heard forgive and forget. But can we really forget? More importantly, do we continually think of them?

John Climacus says, “Remembrance of wrongs comes as the final point of anger. It is a keeper of sins. It hates a just way of life. It is the ruin of virtues, the poison of the soul, a worm in the mind.”

Whom do you know with a ruined life because of the poison in the mind that just cannot get over the wrong done? I hope that isn’t you–or your spouse.

John also says, “The man who has put a stop to anger has also wiped out remembrance of wrongs, since offspring can come only from a living parent.”

Think on that sentence. There is deep meaning.

Such is the ninth step. Let him who has taken it have the courage henceforth to ask Jesus the Savior to free him from his sins.

Posted in Attitude, Awareness, Disciplines, emotions | Leave a Comment »

Freedom From Anger Is A Step Toward Divine Ascent

June 21, 2018

Anger reveals itself everywhere these days. I just listened to a teaching on Zephaniah. She talked about handling the truth. Like the line from A Few Good Men when Jack Nicholson asks “What do you want” and Cruise replies “I want the truth” and Nicholson rebuts “You can’t handle the truth”.

If the prophets in Zephaniah’s time told the king the truth, the king killed them. Zephaniah was lucky. He only got life in prison.

Someone makes an assertion that is blatantly a lie, or maybe to be kind, a mistake. Someone else points out the facts. Wow! Just wait for the bombs to quit going off.

I have a policy on social media. If someone reposts those angry and usually inaccurate memes, I mute them. My emotional health is soooo much better.

But let’s look at ourselves. Do you remember the last time you were angry? Really angry?

I can. And I’m ashamed of the moment some 10 years or so later. Anger springs from many things. Often a sense of inadequacy.

John Climacus has an observation, of course. The first toward freedom from anger is to keep the lips silent when the heart if stirred; the next, to keep thoughts silent when the soul is upset; the last, to be totally calm when unclean winds are blowing. Anger is an indication of concealed hatred, of grievance nursed. Anger is the wish to harm someone who has provoked you.

As we climb the ladder of Divine Ascent, “On the eighth step the crown is freedom from anger. He who wears it by nature may never come to wear another. But he who has searched for it and won it has conquered all eight together.”

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