I have an awful time allowing myself to feel angry. A recent example. Some students have been brashly abusing a new university policy. Many would naturally feel irritation at their disrespect for rules, and at the unfairness to those who take the policy to heart. I resisted those feelings – and got myself anxious and depressed as a result.
Why do I repress angry emotions? Because anger is several times over frightening. The anger of others meant physical danger when I was young; it was associated with chaos. (Just the sight of that fist above makes me cringe.) I worry that others might reject me if I expressed anger towards them. I worry that, though my behaviour has always been gentle, my feelings of anger would turn to violent venting if I didn’t tamp them down. Solution: sublimate.
Why shouldn’t I repress anger? To begin with, I tend to experience the anger as something else – sadness, fear – just as I did the other day. More deeply, expressing anger in proper measure is closely connected to having proper boundaries. At a minimum, not admitting anger gets in the way of an authentic expression of boundaries. Not showing your “inner boundaries”, you can’t pursue your own goals. Worse, being unable to feel anger, you have no “inner boundaries”; and without them, there is no “authentic you”.
Proper boundaries, after all, track values, and those are a huge part of one’s identity. You are (at least in part) what you want for yourself and for others. So, no anger, no boundaries; no boundaries, no values; no values, no me.
So, what are my values? They are… a topic for another post.