From AUGH to Peace in 90 Seconds

A month ago, if you had approached me at 9:30pm, after a fourteen hour day, just as my toddler was screaming that he could not find his GREEN BEAR who had ALL BY HIMSELF slipped from his fingers to the far reaches of the crib (making it officially a dozen times that I had been called in during the 35 minutes since I had laid him down), and you had suggested I "just calm down and shake it off", let's just say I would surely have regretted what would likely have been a decidedly un-ministerial response.

Anger ,next to his cousin, Fear, is, for me, the most challenging of emotions. The more my spiritual training has encouraged me to witness my emotions and to examine what happens to me physically and psychologically when emotions arise, the more I have noticed that the BIG emotions that seem to overcome me, especially fear, anxiety, and anger, feel like a stifling cloak that I want to yank off. The Buddha said of anger, "Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned." So each morning, for about a year now, upon waking, I practice a small ritual of giving thanks, offering prayer, and reminding myself of all the tools at my disposal to handle any situation that arises in my day. I renew my daily pledge to maintain calm and patience, especially with those closest to me, and vow to speak softly, with conviction and love. And usually, at least once a day, generally by late afternoon, I find myself hollering at my son, "Don't you dare SCREAM AT ME, young man!" (To which he generally replies, "I'm not a young man, mama, I a Big Boy.")

Anger's, big Sister, Guilt, swoops in and takes her place. And the voices start. "What the hell, I mean heck, is wrong with YOU, young lady. Who do you think you are to espouse living a conscious life as you scream at your beautiful, perfect, little boy? I thought you were practicing Buddhism? I thought Jesus and Muhammed also both taught you that you are in control of setting your intent to do good, to care for others, to love above all. You know this!" And then I remind myself that Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammed were never mothers.
A friend of my sister's, who is herself a mother of young children, told me of a book that explained that a mother's brain is actually wired to respond in kind to her child—that we are actually physically rigged to want to raise our voices when they do, to smile and holler and jump as they do. I never saw the book. I don't even know if I'm remembering what she told me correctly. But believing this sure gives me a sense of relief when these moments arise. Especially for the days when I turn around to see my husband has come in and is shaking his head, or giving me the sign we agreed means, "take it down a notch, mama."

The book I'm reading right now is Stroke of Insight, by Jill Bolte Taylor. You've probably read it yourself, or at least heard of her. This is the woman who I believe first became famous as her talk on TED became a viral video online, and who then appeared on Oprah, and whose book is on the New York Times bestseller list. Dr. Jill is a neuroanatomist—a brain scientist—who, at 37 years old, watched herself have a stroke. Dr. Jill's stroke, affecting the left hemisphere of her brain, left her temporarily with only the right side functioning, and, thus, a sense of absolute bliss and total connection to oneness and nirvana. The book speaks to a great deal of fascinating phenomena, including the anatomy of parts of the brain and how they interact to create our language, comprehension, and brain chatter (left) as well as sense
of unity, empathy, and great all-encompassing love-without-boundaries (right). But here's the part that has had the biggest impact on me right now. Taylor writes, "Although there are certain limbic systems (emotional) programs that can be triggered automatically, it takes less than ninety seconds for one of these programs to be triggered, surge through our body, and then be completely flushed out of our bloodstream. My anger response, for example, is a programmed response that can be set off automatically. … If, however, I remain angry after those ninety seconds have passed, then it is because I have chosen to let that circuit continue to run." (153)

Night before last, a few minutes before 10pm, there is finally silence from our little one's room. Suddenly, "Blanket! Blanket! … BLANKEEEEEEET!" I snap at my husband. He snaps back. I throw open the baby's door and yank the blanket , and put it back on his body. I go to my room for a self-imposed time-out. I punch a pillow. And then, I remember. Ninety seconds. I take a couple of deep breaths, feel the emotion coursing out, then put on a grin. It feels like taking off a cloak. I feel lighter. Does it feel like covering up my emotions? No, it felt more liking hanging a heavy coat out to dry and trading it in for the Spring model.