In my experience, there’s something about driving a car that provokes anger
more than almost any other activity.
Last week, someone honked at me for not turning fast enough when the light changed to green. I was so irritated that for several blocks, I kept looking in my rearview mirror, trying to figure out who had done it.
When I finally took a mental step back and saw what I was doing, I was astonished. And I was torn.
It was sort of like back in college, when the bar closed at 2 am and the lights snapped on and I suddenly realized how awful everyone looked. Sticky, sweaty, covered in beer. It was a moment of reckoning. Did I face the glaring reality, which seemed to indicate that the fun time I’d just been having was actually a horrible mess? Or did I dive out into the dark to seek more oblivion and forget what I’d seen?
As I kept driving, watching my anger from a bit of a distance, I wavered between those two options once again. Part of me really wanted to jump back into the dark, let the anger take over, keep the party going. There’s a particular pleasure in anger. A feeling of righteousness, because I’m correct, and everyone else is wrong. The party feels quite exclusive. VIP.
The other part of me saw how insane this was.
If the frequent instances of road rage are any indication, I don’t think I’m the only one experiencing mental anger fiestas while driving.
Since most anger is at some level a reaction to fear, it does make sense that it arises while we’re on the road, as there’s quite a lot to worry about while driving a large chunk of metal at speeds so fast that, until very recently, humans were unable to experience them. Things can, and often do, go wrong. Accidents with other drivers, pedestrians, animals, or any other hazards in the road could result in financial problems and serious injuries.
And even if nothing goes wrong, there’s still the constant concern about the car’s condition, the status of all the various required insurances and licenses and registrations, the cops on the road, the pollution, the destroyed habitats.
While we probably aren’t consciously thinking of all these stressors while driving, there is a lurking anxiousness in many of us. And if someone else’s frustration gets directed our way, with a honk or a mean look or a rude gesture, it’s like an invitation blasts out, attracting a rush of angry thoughts so quickly that it seems they were already waiting there, just biding their time. Like they’re ready to party.
This is good.
Anger can be a helpful alarm. It’s loud enough to grab our attention and alert us that there are things present in our minds that we don’t normally detect. Because anger can only throw a party if there are plenty of guests who will attend.
I like to think of our minds like houses. During our lives, we spend a lot of time not paying attention to what’s going on in our personal house. We’re up in the attic, peering out the windows, worrying about what’s going on in every body else’s homes. Are they all having fun without us, out there? Is everyone else’s house better than ours?
In this state of distraction, a lot of things come through the door that we aren’t aware of. Experiences, beliefs, painful emotions. Finding no one around to stop them, since we’re preoccupied up in the attic, they just make themselves at home. They start modifying things, designing the space any way they like. And if we question these interlopers about their presence in the house, they turn the tables on us. They convince us that they’re the ones in charge, that actually, we’re the living in the house they own. That we don’t have any power. Almost always, we believe it.
Chastened, we retreat to the attic. Eventually, we just get used to it. We let the creatures do whatever they want, careful to keep the curtains drawn so that nobody outside the house knows about the crazy things going on inside. Sometimes, we shut the attic door if anything particularly painful tries to come through, but otherwise we are at the mercy of the creatures. Our ears our filled with the strange things they keep whispering through the cracks in the floor. Our house feels out of control. It’s
not a fun place to be, but we think there’s no other option. That this madness is who we are. And so we keep to the attic, and we keep peering outside, finding any distraction we can.
When strong emotions like anger decide to throw a rager, though, it can turn our attention back inside. Usually, excited by the prospect of the righteous fun, we run downstairs, the lights go out, the sound turns up, and we party. There is a moment, though, right when you turn inward. When anger has its hand on the switch, about to submerge us in the dark and the creatures are gathering. If we pay attention at this moment, if we take a breath, we can command that everyone “freeze!”
The creatures must obey. Because, actually, this whole time, this house has been ours. And with the light still on, and the creatures all gathered, we can take a look around.
Keeping a careful distance, maybe crossing our arms, we finally assume the role of the host, waiting patiently for these unruly guests to tell us what they’re doing here. The angry creatures, bits of fury we’ve gathered throughout our lives, which we’ve never processed, which we’ve repressed, are stunned for a moment. They might try to convince us again that this is their house. But if we just raise a brow and keep peacefully observing, they’ll start to move around in agitation. Some will scatter back to their hiding places in the house, but a few, caught in our attention, start to edge toward the door.
For me, anger takes a definite path on its way out of my body. It rises up through my torso, up my throat and out the top of my head. As if the top of my head is the front door that faces the rest of the world.
I like to imagine that painful emotions are happy to leave me. That I had trapped them unnaturally, and now I’m setting them free.
Each time we reassume our rightful role as the landlord of our mind, and peacefully
observe these uncomfortable emotions, it gets easier to see them on their way. And, I’ve heard that if we do this enough, and release all these creatures living in our minds one by one, that we’ll eventually be free of them. Creatures will still come through the door, but now we’ll be there waiting, watching, and they’ll go right back out again.
We’ll have a clean house, that we can decorate however we want.
So, yes, this is all to say, I’m grateful to the anger that comes. Even when I’m driving.
design + surrender 