Tracing frustration and anger before cutting the wire.
The expression across from me looks hurt more than frustrated.
Today I'm standing in a conference room, leaning up against a table while having a conversation with someone on my team. It's mid-afternoon but it's hard to tell with the fluorescent lighting. Outside, it's hot as hell and humid enough that I'm still sweating even though the AC is blasting.
Sitting across from me, this person's explaining that they're frustrated. Apparently, they'd had a rather rude interaction with someone else and it'd escalated unexpectedly. Rolling their shoulders forward, I watch them exhale, stare into the ground, and slouch lower. I'm picturing the wheel of emotions and trying to trace the line between hurt and frustration. Sadness and anger come to mind, and I'm reminded of something I learned from my therapist a while back.
When she introduced me to the wheel of emotions, she explained that anger can come from letting ourselves down. I didn't quite get it until she framed it as an indicator of our boundaries being violated. So it's the difference between being mad at someone and being mad at yourself for not standing up to them. And while I'm leaning on that table listening to my teammate so I can try to help, I realized that relabling anger like that had been a turning point for me.
Now, I can't help but to see anger as a red herring. A lot of the time, it turns out to be a decoy; where the thing I'm upset about has to do with how I handled something. Fixing it tends to be as simple as doing the thing I neglected to do in the first place.
Straightforward? Maybe.
Easy? No.
So, stills sweating in the conference room with the AC blasting, I ask the person across from me what would be helpful. They say they're not sure, so I ask if I can offer a suggestion. "Yes please" they say, looking up.
"Telling them it was rude might feel validating... and even if they don't agree, you'll have done what it sounds like you wanted to do in the first place."
Our Daily MAP Year Prompt
279/365
Are you able to find the fuse and cut the wire when you're mad?
onward.
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