Inside Out: Anger

We have long misunderstood anger, villainised this emotion, focusing on its outright appearance. Granted anger definitely is not a pleasant emotion, but very often we focus on this aspect, and fail to examine and analyse the motivation behind all the raised voices, the reddening huff and puff looks. As compared to other more subtle unpleasant emotions (e.g. pride, envy, greed), actually anger may not be as vicious, as what you see is definitely what you get, and when you examine the motivation behind them, one may actually have some sympathy for the cause, leading to another beautiful emotion, namely graciousness.

We need not look too far, we can see that even our Heavenly Father was quite an angry God, be it with His very own chosen people, or those who oppressed His chosen people (so many examples in the Old Testament). Also, many renowned Old Testament prophets were very angry people. The best example would be Moses, who got so angry with the Egyptian slave driver to the point he murdered him (I’ll get back to this example later). Oh yes even in the New Testament, one of the most famous apostles, Paul, was a firebrand, be it whether it was before or after his conversion. Just have a look at some of his fiery letters, he publicly told Peter off for discriminating against the Gentiles.

All anger stems from the reaction to a very simple premise. That something is not right, in fact it is horribly wrong, and we cannot stomach it. In fact, this anger at all the wrongs in life is amazing proof that we’re made in God’s image, that we have inherited God’s thirst for justice. However, though we have indeed gotten God’s desire for righting wrongs in this world, we have not gotten that same full wisdom of judgement, and that is where complications start arising.

Most of the time, when we suffer severe indigestion over the wrongs of life, we are suffering it in the identities of ourselves, with ourselves being THE best judge over right and wrong, not in the identities of disciples of God, who question what God would have wanted. This is a very big struggle of mine, considering I have an extremely high J streak, and I have to consciously jack up my P to counter this, to give others the chance to explain themselves.

And even if we have assessed correctly over whether it is a right or wrong situation, we may not necessarily be equipped with the wisdom to think of the best alternative course of action. Here I’ll bring in the example of Moses. Definitely the Egyptian slave driver was doing wrong with the bullying and such. However, Moses’ reaction of murdering that slave driver there and then is definitely not the best solution. The fact that he was not yet ready with wisdom and courage is further evidenced by his later reaction of running off when confronted with his act. I believe God let him stay in the outlands for forty years, not so much as a punishment, but more for him to spend time reflecting on his past brash actions, in turn training him up with tact in the future for leading the Israelites out.

At the expense of sounding like an Once Upon a Time drama character Regina fanatic, I’ll bring in the drama example of her again. For those who have followed the series since its inception, you will know the motivation behind Regina’s fuming anger with Snow White is not the vanity as depicted in the traditional fairytale or Julia Robert’s Mirror Mirror film version (we shan’t dwell into accuracy of depiction as it is not the aim of this blog entry, though for those who are interested in having a talk with me on this, please feel free to drop me a message J). Granted, her anger was definitely justified, considering that Snow White’s naïve action had resulted in the tragic death of her childhood sweetheart. However, the course of Regina’s subsequent actions, generally summed up in her famous one-liner “I’ll destroy your happiness even if it is the last thing I do”, was what made her branded as “evil” (thankfully she is steadily on the road to redemption from the way the drama is proceeding).  

I guess apart from the obvious question of asking ourselves why we get angry (this filters away a lot of the pride, greed, envy masquerading as anger), it is much more urgent to ask ourselves the “what next”. More often than not, after we ask ourselves this, we will sense the anger giving way to something else. In season 3 of OUAT, Tinkerbell questioned Regina’s wisdom in clinging onto that anger, trying to convince her that the act of letting the anger go would grant her happiness. Regina however was fearful that by relinquishing that anger, she would be left with nothing, which to her was weakness. Quite often we struggle to retain this control over our lives, taking it as a sign of power and strength. However, life was never ours to control, we only control ourselves. Moreover, as the Beatitudes passage in the gospel showed, this weakness be a blessing, a yearning for solace with God (in the OUAT drama’s example, I would think it is symbolized by Regina’s love for her stepson Henry). As my spiritual director mentioned earlier during my sessions with her, it is not “react” but “respond”.

I had watched the play Off Center on last Sunday afternoon, leaving with the piping emotions of a volanco awaiting explosion. I guess I was reminded of many hurtful memories with regard to my medical history of mental illness. All of a sudden, the buried anger of the past years towards everyone (family, friends, colleagues, adversaries) seemed to be like resurrected zombies rising from their graves, threatening to inflict World War Z. Thankfully out of desperation, I quickly prayed for the indication of something bigger in life and He let me see them just before I turned in for bed. 

If anger for justice is like the majestic sun beating down upon us as we toil daily in the fields, then gentle mercy is something else, just as beautiful, though in another unique method of its own. It is like the stars peering out of the cleared up night skies. During the gloom of the night, sometimes they are not visible, though they are just as constant as the sun, just much more tender in brightness. The astronomy theory is that stars are “burnt out” versions of the sun, and that the fate awaiting our sun is that similar to the stars. In the similar way, after experiencing the burning intense anger towards the wrongs inflicted by us in life, we ask ourselves “what next” and we quell ourselves into these specks of little brightness waiting patiently to let the ultimate source of light to do all that is necessary. That may be what God means by not letting the sun go down while we are angry. Only then do we notice the stars that accompany us during the night before the daybreak.

In your anger do not sin. Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.

Ephesians 4:26-27 (NIV)

Inside Out: Introduction

I've used the title of the upcoming Pixar cartoon Inside Out for this reflection series on emotions. I think their concept of depicting emotions as a cartoon with each one as a personified individual is an interesting and novel idea for a film, and I'm indeed looking forward to the film. However real life is not so clear cut, as when I was running through my mind about this up blog reflections, I could around feel a lot of interlinking abound, which may not actually be such a bad thing after all. Just as my sister was teasing me last night about whether I was in a good mood, I replied her honestly that I was "undecided and mixed", as my moods towards different aspects of my life were veering all over the place, making it hard to simply place them under a positive versus negative divide.

This first entry is a preface thanking to a friend who made me realise the importance of acknowledging emotions in the first place. Around four years ago, I had bombarded her with my frustration with the cauldron of emotions I was experiencing, praying desperately for God to wrench them out of me, and she had introduced me to spiritual direction, silent retreat, without which I would not be the Catholic neophyte I am now. Today, there's still that whole big whole pot of juices of emotions inside, I'm still as lost as to what their purpose is as my life hasn't really progressed at all, though I've come appreciate them for the indicators they are.

With regard to the "what purpose does it serve" question, I think my spiritual director Roselie may have given me some inkling during my numerous sessions with her where she brought up the term "react". Emotions by themselves do not serve any purpose apart from being mere indicators of our train of thought, our mindset, our principles, our beliefs, about ourselves and others. Emotions are like reflections in a mirror. How we react to those reflections, is what ultimately defines the "purpose", if usage of that word is correct. 

In fact, I owe all of my emotions an apology. Without them, I wouldn't be all over the moon prancing away when I got my sword two weeks ago. Without them, my upcoming Germany trip would be a mere rest without the element of adventure and exploration. Without them, I wouldn't have left the theatre melancholic without a word after watching the play Fat Pig three years ago, compared to my companion who had dismissively slammed the verdict "Hummph, he doesn't love her enough." Without them, watching the play Public Enemy wouldn't have been such a satisfying contemplative activity such that I went home raving about it to my Dad. Without them I wouldn't have turn in to bed the way I did, when my parents returned safely from their Japan trip last night. Without them, I wouldn't have felt the relief I did when my sister announced her conclusion of her long-drawn job hunt on Wednesday night. Without them, I wouldn't be able to tease my other sister last night when she and her boyfriend were bantering with each other in the living room. I could go on and on, and I haven't even touched on the emotions after listening to certain songs, reading various books, watching different movies and drama series. As another friend of mine replied about it the other day that these emotions are for me to really live and experience life to the fullest, as cliché as it may sound. Afterall, all emotions positive or negative arise from love or the lack of it. I am grateful I have never lost sight of the importance of love in my life.

Thus, the aim of this series is really more of a "getting comfortable with my reflection in the mirror", turning myself "inside out" series. No point in breaking the mirror anyway, as I'd only cut and hurt myself with the shards. It's high time to take a good look at what's in the pot, one by one, since when I look at the pot in entirety, it is overwhelming.

I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture.  The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

John 10:9-10 (NIV)

My Ribena Stain

No, my parents did not attend my confirmation rite in the church over Holy week last Saturday. In retrospect, it was a blessing in disguise. They did not have to witness the disaster during the final stage before I was to go to receive my very first Eucharist. Now I look at it, it really was for the better. I do not know how my father would have reacted had he witnessed first-hand on those emotions going through me. I think I have put him through enough turmoil in my earlier experiences, such that God would want to spare him this.

Instead what he got was something else instead. In the week before, he had told his daughter to be mindful when sharing the joy of salvation and upholding the covenant on online platforms like Facebook (i.e. my careless unedited original posting of my confirmation card with much of my personal information). She had silently took the advice in and gone ahead for the ceremony on Saturday. Yes, she came back on that night on a very muted tone, and he definitely could sense something had gone amiss. However, he also knew that since she had been able to make her way home safely, on the overall most was still well. So he decided to pull off his very own first “water into wine” of sorts.

When I came home on Monday, he had let me stay in his study where he and mum were looking videos of the cherry blossoms they were going to view in Japan in the next week. Then all of a sudden he veered into an unknown territory.

“So this name of yours now? Apart from that first one I don’t know what, now there’s this other one. The name that sounds like that drink.”

“… It is now Clare Regina. Clare for baptism, Regina for confirmation.”

“Ah… So troublesome, I’ll keep pronouncing it as Ribena.”

“Aiyo, just call her Wenhui like we always do lah,” my mum interjected.

For the next few minutes the three of us just continued looking at the videos of the cherry blossom, being comfortable in each other’s presence.

From what I know of my father, nickname calling has always been a term of endearment, though many of it are very derogatory. If he calls you by full proper name, then you are in serious major trouble. So I guess it means I am alright and cleared despite last Saturday. It was merely a Ribena stain on the white robe, that’s all.