Nausea.
That was what I felt when my Rolfing guy pushed on a spot deep inside my hip during our session Friday afternoon.
I didn’t just feel his pressure in my hip, I felt a sickening feeling deep inside my abdomen. Foreign. Undefined.
A part of myself I had no connection to, no understanding with, no acknowledgement of.
Then on Tuesday morning I woke up with a pain.
I had dreamed about a fictional fight with my ex, where he hadn’t told me he was moving to San Diego (no idea where that hypothetical came from). When I confronted him, he acted as if I was overreacting and started talking on the phone to a woman at work. I ripped the iPhone from his hands, hung up his call, and woke up.
Woke up to queasy pain in my lower left belly.
Later that morning, as I sat in Panera trying to write and enjoy a shortbread cookie, the email came.
The rental house in St. Louis (which is both underwater and renting at below my monthly overhead cost) needs a new heater. The current one (12 years old) has crapped out and is leaking carbon monoxide. Fml.
I quickly packed up my stuff and drove home so I could be in immediate proximity to my own private bathroom.
(Details are tmi. But you get the idea.)
Since I was useless, I sat down in the leather chair in the corner of my bedroom and listened to a mediation on my new iPhone app Meditation Oasis - a ”Guided Meditation for Anger.”
And that’s when I found it.
Deep inside of me, on that lower left side of my abdomen, is a knot.
A blockage.
A dense oval of packed darkness, energy that has been contained, for years, decades, inside a thick leather shell.
I found where the anger lives.
Left free to discharge, anger is just an energy. Just a measuring tool to give you information about your life and how things are affecting you. Just something to let go of and let it continue its way in the universe.
But … I don’t get angry.
It’s not my “go-to” emotion. I just get frustrated or annoyed or another word more socially acceptable. I’ve even felt a bit evolved for avoiding such a bad feeling.
But of course, that’s bullshit.
Of course I feel angry. Of course I get pissed. I just quickly pushed it down into the knot, for long-term storage and avoidance.
I go straight from anger into self-doubt and guilt and shame and other feelings that fit into my story loops.
I force the anger into the compaction inside my belly, avoiding any admittance that I’m capable of anger, that I’m justified in being angry, that I have the right to stand up for myself.
The angry turned into a stagnation.
It keeps me from being able to fully ground. From being able to fully be present. From being able to fully connect with the infinite.
It blocks me from being all of myself.
But as much as I want to create a space for it to be free, for it to discharge, for me to learn from it and just let the energy free back into the universe, I couldn’t yet.
The blockage is safe.
I’m afraid if I release the constant pressure, if I let it free, it will explode. It will consume me. It will consume the universe.
I’m afraid that if I’m no longer blocked, if I can be all of myself … then I will be too big.
Like she said, I’m not afraid of my darkness, I’m used to that.
I’m afraid of what I could become.
The bigness, the infinite possibility, the grande power … it terrifies me.
Oy.
Yes, I promised to Be Bold EveryDay.
And as much as being bold is about publishing the 55-Things post and creating a Facebook group for INFJs and shooting video in public. As much as being bold is about asking for reviews of my podcast and asking for help and asking for a playdate.
As much as being bold is about speaking my truth, I think the most bold thing I will ever do is this.
To have the boldness, the courage, the strength, to allow myself to be healed.
To allow myself to be great.
To allow myself to be everything.
#thatisall
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What is your relationship to anger? Do you have feelings or emotions or hurts that you have been storing in your body? Do you have something blocking you from being all of yourself?
Please share your story, comments, questions, reactions below – I’d love to hear from you!
I'm Elizabeth Potts Weinstein, an attorney, mom, writer, and explorer.