Grief, Anger, And Rage
Excerpt from the chapter
Men, as discussed in my first book, use anger to cover their grief. This is because “big boys don’t cry,” and they certainly don’t grieve. They may go off into a corner, sullen, and drink themselves into oblivion, or find a myriad of distractions refocusing their attention, but they are taught that grieving shows weakness and is feminine.
The opposite is true for women, for whom grieving is permitted. Not too much of course, otherwise the medical profession (witch doctors) will too readily prescribe a tranquilizer, mood elevator, etc. So even full grieving is not allowed for anyone. We will cover this later; for now let’s look at what women use grief to cover.
Anger is the emotion women are not allowed to express. “Nice girls don’t get angry,” is the verbal or non-verbal directive taught to most women by the patriarchal social structure. Often, both in life and in my practice, I would come across depression in women, which on the surface looks a lot like unexpressed grief. Looking deeper I found their grief usually was being used to cover repressed anger. Anger stewed in our place of repressed energies, the shadow transforms into rage. When a female client would come across a scene in her life that was painful or traumatic, she would easily start crying and grieving. Yet, she found it nearly impossible to be angry with the person who had wronged her. These clients may have been beaten, raped, or otherwise abused; yet there was no anger. The opposite I found true for male clients, who immediately get angry, but find in nearly impossible to cry and grieve
Men are only allowed to express anger, which is necessary for the warrior. No other emotions are permitted. Women are allowed all emotions, except anger. Now, recently, women are making headway in expressing anger. I have spoken to a number who proclaim they express their anger freely. But when we dig deeper, usually we find that the most important aspects, their deepest darkest feelings, especially from childhood, they remain mute about.
Men are taught to base themselves in their minds; women are to be based in their emotions. Therefore, women are also denied in varying degrees their abilities to be logical and to develop reason. Naturally, this would prevent women from living their heritage to be Goddesses of Wisdom. It deprives the world of this wisdom, and we deeply need it.
BOUNDARIES
Anger is not wrong; it is an important emotion for both genders. It declares something to be unacceptable in a strong way, and it creates or reinforces one’s boundaries. Boundaries are important, and women often don’t have well-set boundaries, especially where needed. Or they may go to the opposite extreme and use rigid dictates they follow to replace their appropriate individual boundaries. Like the so-called “book of rules.” Book of guidelines would be a far better concept. Boundaries represent your clear expression of your true self to others. Lack of boundaries, or too rigid or too harsh boundaries, is a reflection of an inner emotional makeup that includes confusion about self and poor self-esteem.
Positive boundaries do not harm or degrade others; they clearly state limits, without attacking or degrading those who approach our limits. They are important defining characteristics of desire in a healthy relationship.
Integrity, keeping our word, is a key factor in creating positive boundaries and is the critical factor of self-esteem. We know when we have been dishonest; yet, we suffer from self-imposed blindness to our lack of integrity, as we have repressed into our shadows our disingenuous actions. This does its self-destructive work in the shadows, damaging our self-esteem. Then, we wonder why we may never feel quite good enough. Always hold to your word – or loose your self-esteem!