I set aside these feelings for a good portion of the day, but tonight while I am trying to wind down they have bubbled to the surface again in a most unpleasant way. In fact, I'm feeling a bit sick to my stomach because I am so angry...
Vipassana Buddhist teacher Gil Fronsdal has the following to say about anger in his book The Issue at Hand:
The Buddhist word dosa, usually translated as anger, might more accurately be translated as "hostility," provided we recognize that hostility can be present in emotions ranging from minor aversion to full blown rage...Dosa burns the one who is angry. Classic Buddhist teachings liken being angry to holding a red-hot piece of coal. For Buddhists, acting on dosa is never justified; dosa is a form of suffering that Buddhist practice is designed to alleviate.
Hostile anger seems to have its roots in recoiling from our own pain...
Anger is always a signal. Mindfulness helps reveal what it signals. Sometimes tells us that something in the external world needs to be addressed, sometimes that something is off internally. If nothing else, anger is a signal that someone is suffering. Probably it is you. Sit still in the midst of your anger and find your freedom from that suffering.
I don't wish to suffer in this way.
Really.
It doesn't move me forward in my journey.
So, I'm sitting still in the midst of my anger. Trying to breathe. Attempting to be mindful. Working on letting go of my dosa towards the yahoos and of the anger I'm directing toward myself for wanting to believe them.
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