I also love your visualization of anger as a stone to be lifted. I think that will be so helpful for me, to understand where my anger comes from, why it escapes into rage. Thankfully as I’ve grown I have learned to control my violent physical explosions, and for me medication for depression and anxiety was a huge part of that. For negative thinking I use “That is a story that does not need to happen.” Now I can add “What is under this stone of anger? to my emotional toolbox.

Thank you for another thought-provoking and valuable post.

As for anger within in the church, it still BOGGLES my mind and heart that women MY AGE (I’m thirty, for goodness sake) and younger so easily accept the “your man is your overlord” philosophy. Or men in general – that’s why I cannot in good faith attend a church that doesn’t let women participate in ministry – it’s ridiculous. I remember the moment where I realized that I “knew more” than my pastor as far as Old Testament knowledge went – and realized that I didn’t have “authority” to say what I knew in front our of congregation. That’s when I was done, so to speak.

I know they justify it with scripture, and I know many men only want to do good by their wives, but there’s also that handful that enjoy their “authority” far too much. But I can’t get over it. I honestly believe that by doing this, we put so much pressure on our men, to DIE for us? To have all the answers? One morning in Bible study another woman confessed to not feeling ready to have a 2nd child, but her husband felt that they should, and so she was ’submitting’ to his wisdom. I looked at her in disbelief.

That said, I’m all about a wonderful partnership, and I trust my husband to make good decisions for our family, even sacrifice for our well-being, just as I do for us. I could write about this for days, and maybe I will…

One day I am going to write a book about the spirituality of doubt, despair, & desolation and explore some of the great mystics and saints who write about the how essential these experiences are in our journey toward the sacred. I’d love to see your book on the spirituality of anger right next to it on the shelf. Better yet, the pages open wide across the laps of women everywhere.

I suppose I am firmly placed within the post modern culture. I definitely value transparency and authenticity. I was raised a Buddhist, not Christian at all, although I do remember that we were expected to convert people, even as children. I would suppose that’s one of the reasons I left.

But I was also trained as a girl to not make a ruckus, to not be angry, to not set my unstable father off.

I still have problems with confrontation. I have to consciously choose to confront an issue. And for some reason, I ended up with a partner who has anger issues.

Sometimes I think life puts in front of us the challenges we need to overcome in order to be our highest selves.

It’s really annoying.

In my small little mom, dad, sister family I got the regular dose of ‘responsibility’, ‘good behavior’, ‘don’t talk back’, etc. etc., even without a church influence. (I’ve never attended church.) But, I didn’t spend much time at home as a child. Both my parents worked so I spent my before school hours, after school hours, and summers with the other members of my family. Here is where I learned the facts of life. My most important life lessons were learned during this time spent away from my mom and dad- including how to express anger.

All my cousins bit, hit, threw stuff, chased, pinched, and generally hurt each other out of anger. And someone was always angry at someone else. My aunt was a busy person and did not have time to constantly supervise us. When she found out about the hitting and throwing stuff, kids were punished by being spanked or yelled at. I grew up thinking that physical contact and yelling were perfectly valid ways to express anger.

I picked up these bad habits and I am still trying to shake them. When I get angry I still have a hard time not hitting. At home I was still told ‘don’t hit’ and ‘don’t fight with your sister’. Luckily these lessons are the ones that I am trying to live by. When I do hit someone out of anger I immediately regret it and hate myself for not paying attention to what I’m doing. I cry when I am angry. I cry because I don’t know how to deal with how I’m feeling. Hopefully I’ll learn how to express my anger better, I’m working on it.

I used to write for and edit denominational publications. My words were forever tempered to fit the ‘lady-like’ mode you speak of. One day I realised my very life was being edited to fit within that mold. Authenticity was such a strong core value for me that I had to walk away from it all. Right when my talents were being recognised and I was being head-hunted for overseas publications.

I was also involved in youth ministry and introducing soulful creative spiritual spaces and practices that pomo gens relate well to. The kids loved it but the ‘authorities’ squashed it, fearing things unknown, calling those activities and me things we are not.

To answer your questions: I have not found a way to express anger within a conservative religious construct. When trying to write pissy, in a ladylike manner, all I ended up with was prissy :-)

A breakthrough for me in dealing with anger has been to process things through creative arts therapy. To move away from words (the preferred church communication method), and into images, symbols, sounds, movement. More recently I have been doing some work with ‘toning’ and it is profoundly healing.

And I think there was also a more subtle dynamic going on in the community in which I was raised. Women were expected to be educated. We were expected to be bright. Being a bluestocking was as acceptable as being a wife and mother, a nun or a teacher. But women were not expected to express their intelligence in any way that would rock the boat. It was as if intellectual arguments could be made (although not against the fundamentals of the church), but they must be made in a bloodless, cool way. No anger, no guts.

And for me, at least, all the anger swelling and surging behind that seawall of expectations has often spilled back onto my self. I’ve stuffed the feelings back with food and other poisons. I’ve been paralysed into non-action or distracted by relentless action.

It’s really only quite recently, in my early fifties, that I realised how deep it all runs and I’m still searching for ways to express it.