When we're MAD at ourselves

Thriving Together
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This is the approach I use. Please, if you have other approaches that work for you, shared wisdom on this is welcome!

I am mad at myself… because…

  1. Start with the because. List however many reasons come up.

Note: The reason we’re mad is often an unmet need.

  • Because I didn’t stand up for myself.
  • Because I really needed something different and I didn’t ask for it.
  • I didn’t want to and did it anyway.
  1. Tap on any that come up. Such as:
  • Even though I am so MAD at myself… I didn’t stand up for myself! I deeply and completely accept that standing up for myself is important to me!"

Tap a few rounds here. Play with the words. Find what hits home.

  1. Take the because and add another because. Why? It’s essential to go deeper. For example: I didn’t stand up for myself…
  • Because… I didn’t feel safe.
  • Because… I didn’t know what to say.
  • Because… I ignore my intuition and by the time I wanted to do something I was already triggered.

  1. Ok. There’s guidance coming here. You’re starting to identify what shifts your inner wisdom is asking for. First, tap on that truth. “I didn’t feel safe.” Or even “I wasn’t actually safe.” Or, “I didn’t feel safe because I have this triggered past experience still very much alive for me.”

  2. What emotional skill asking for strengthening?

Speaking up for ourselves is a Big Deal for many who have been punished or persecuted for setting such boundaries. If you are mad at yourself for not speaking up, that is likely the “safer choice” that your brain came up with long ago – at a time when clearly speaking out against harm and abuse might have been death-defying and beyond a child’s capacity.

As we explored in the workshop on Boundaries in Motion, if we want to take a graceful exit or communicate in savvy ways, we need language and skillful practice. I don’t know any other way.

Especially for non-violent people who don’t want to STRIKE OUT with physical or emotional violence in order to “stand up for themselves” or to run from the room screaming.

How might you ask for a pause kindly? How might you be clear and direct that you need a pause? Either would be speaking up for yourself – and result in less feeling mad at yourself later.

If safety is crucial for you (it is for me!), what exit strategies work for you?

There’s the “truthful lie” – OMG! I need to get to a bathroom IMMEDIATELY!

Could you say that? If not, I’ll practice with you. It’s a way (almost) anyone will pause and let you go. Who wants someone to shit on their chair? :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

“I’ll explain later but I must leave and head home NOW!”

Can you say that? Move towards the door?

If you can’t, and you start feeling mad at yourself because you’re not YET feeling emotionally free like that, go back and tap on being mad and the because.

You might also… include in the tapping how much you hate that other people have put you in situations like that, and have made it SO HARD to share what you need in order to feel safe, respected, and free.

Even though I could be mad at myself again, the truth is that I am angry at them for putting me in this kind of situation… again… and I deeply and completely accept and respect ALL of my feelings about this.

With love,
Rick

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Thank you for this Rick. I got so mad at myself for exploding again after asked if I needed help fixing dinner. I said “yes if you want to clean these mushrooms but don’t use water.” I have a special sponge that I use the rougher back side to clean mushrooms. They immediately ran water over the sponge. I know its a simple thing but I had just said “not with water”. I got so triggered because I didn’t feel listened to or heard. This happens so often, and I had had a very triggering day. I grabbed the sponge and said “Get out of the kitchen!!! “Just get out and go sit down.” Needless to say the rest of the evening was not pleasant and I felt so bad. In some ways it was such a little thing but in another it was so huge. I tapped and tapped and tapped about not being heard, about how mean I felt, about how I was feeling, mean, guilty, unheard, and on and on. Later after lights were out I still felt bad and I found myself in the kitchen in the dark feeling so mad at myself. I don’t like to explode. I felt like such a bad person. I didn’t even feel like I could say my “Thank you angels, thank you Guides.”
I was able to focus on being thankful for the warm blanket that I cover up with at night, the warm showers and other things. I did apologze too and we tried to have a talk but it ended up that he said he just wanted to do the right thing and I felt sad because he didn’t understand. There are times when I feel like such a mean person but really I’m not.
I want to delete this so much.

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I deeply appreciate what you’ve said here. It’s a scene I probably should revise for my own life and have Suno make a song about it.

With two kids here, the impulse to “do things their way even if NOT ok” is raw and real.

I’ve seen it, too, when adults share a kitchen for cooking at the same time… or even later! “This is SUPPOSED to go HERE, not THERE!!!” Eeek, yes.

Shared we-spaces and co-creating is, well, a profound challenge. Lot of people use water to clean mushrooms – guess they like soggy more than I do. Which is THE way?

I don’t know. As a Simpleton Chef I have ways I cook that are different. There’s a part of me that really and truly wants it done MY WAY. Saw that last night when Jem offered to cook the hamburger meat for her soup but she didn’t do it the way I do.

Where is that stress and control coming from?!? I even ended up taking over because in her being distracted by Adira’s demands to do things HER way it was hard for her to even cook Jem’s Way.

Sigh.

It sorta goes to what I was referring to in Thriving vs. Surviving. I feel that activated in me, for example. “This WORKS, so don’t fuck with it and do it differently!”

I mean, if the mushrooms get ruined, are there more? Is it ok to waste them by experimenting and ending up with something “not as yummy”?

The Thriving Mindset in me seems to be asking for more flexibility and curiosity. But… when I’ve been WORK WORK WORKing, my energy system just doesn’t have all that much capacity to do that.

Appreciate you and your Realness. Offers me a space to Be Real, too.

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It wasn’t about the mushrooms. It was about not being heard. It happened again just now. But I wasn’t triggered so I just walked away. I don’t feel like I’ve been heard much in my childhood, my relatives, friends or marriage. Now that I’m allowing myself to feel, not being heard becomes more painful.

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It is. It is so painful. To not be heard, to not be understood.

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