We Did Not Know What Was Coming Series: Stage 2 — The Wrath of Kahn

PREFACE: To say the last seven years have been a journey of growth for me and this country is an understatement. To help me process and cope with the roller-coaster of emotions I have felt these years, I started writing on Medium right after the 2016 election. My last series ended December 31, 2020, after Biden won the presidential election.

Recently I realized I missed writing “in my journal” and decided to go back to the very beginning and re-read my essays. I wanted to see where I started out on November 9, 2016, and where I am now. I decided to repost my favorite blogs with a short present-day commentary and continue onto current times.

I hope a few of you will join me on this journey of recollection, reflection, and learning. Little did we know what we were headed into.

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Stage 2 — The Wrath of Kahn: November 29, 2020

I adore the original Star Trek series which premiered September 8, 1966. The series ran for three seasons treating viewers to seventy-nine episodes. To fan delight the crew was re-assembled in 1979 for the first of six Star Trek movies.

My favorite television episode is Space Seed which introduced us to a memorable villain, Khan Noonien Singh. While on patrol in deep space, Captain Kirk and his crew find and revive a genetically engineered world conqueror, Khan, and his compatriots from Earth’s 20th century. Khan attempts to capture the starship but is thwarted by James T. Kirk and exiled on Ceti Alpha V to create a new society with his people.

In the movie, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, set fifteen years after Space Seed, Khan escapes his exile and sets out to exact revenge upon Kirk after Khan’s beloved wife and most members of his family and crew die of starvation on Ceti Alpha V.

Why am I writing about this? Because the Khan character epitomizes someone mired in and driven to extreme behavior by years of unresolved grief anger. Of all the stages of grief described by Kubler-Ross, anger may be the most difficult one for people to work through, and it often lasts the longest. It has certainly been the most difficult stage of grief for me in the time of Trump.

This is the stage where one begins to assimilate the idea that they have lost a person, job, health, or value system — mourning the sudden loss of everything they had taken for granted but also never considered would be taken away.

In this stage, rather than accepting the loss, one rebels against it. The person tries to find someone or something to blame; they start to feel a constant sense of injustice, resentment, and rage that builds up in their mind and body. Such is the story of Khan.

Common features of grief anger include:

· An obsession with what happened and what could have been done to prevent it

· A desperate search to find explanations, answers, or something/someone to blame

· Constant racing thoughts

· A hypersensitivity whereby unexpected stimulus, news, or events activate feelings of attack and further loss

· Personality and temperament changes whereby the individual may begin to lose perspective, motivation, patience, curiosity, empathy, concern, and compassion for others

· An over or under inflated sense of personal power

· Apathy and body discomfort such as stomach pain, physical and mental fatigue, headaches, insomnia, rapid heart rate, increased blood pressure

· Extreme irritability — a fight response to danger

· Extreme anxiety and fear — a flight response to danger

· Loss of the illusion of being in control of our lives

Anger, associated with loss and the symptoms above, often bring people to my office. We begin the therapeutic journey by exploring three broad categories of anger: passive aggressive anger, aggressive anger and assertive anger. The first two are early stage two grief responses. The last characterizes someone who has found balance. The categories are defined as follows:

Passive Aggressive Anger:

Many individuals do not like to admit they are angry and do whatever they can to avoid confrontation. Passive-aggressive anger may be expressed verbally as sarcasm, pointed silence and/or veiled mockery. The individual may sulk, withdraw, become cold, walk away, procrastinate, and pretend everything is fine.

Sometimes people who express anger passively aren’t even aware that their actions are perceived as aggressive. Whether conscious or unconscious, passive aggressive anger comes from a need to be in control by denying or repressing any feelings of frustration or fury they are experiencing.

Aggressive Anger:

Other people tend to lash out in anger and rage becoming physically or verbally aggressive, often times hurting themselves or others. This comes out in fighting, bullying, blackmailing, accusing, shouting, bickering, sarcasm and criticism.

Aggressive anger comes from a need to be in control and is often used in situations where an individual actively and overtly attempts to exercise dominance, intimidation, manipulation, or control over another.

In the most extreme case aggressive anger becomes bullying, emotionally abusive, oppressive, and/or violent. Back to The Wrath of Khan — consumed with rage and grief — Khan perishes at the end of the movie trying to kill Captain Kirk and his crew, who barely survive.

Assertive Anger:

Assertive anger is the middle ground when it comes to anger. It is the ability to resolve conflicts in a way that is productive and respectful to everyone concerned. It means the individual is talking about the situation that has caused disharmony without intentionally hurting other peoples’ feelings.

Anger is expressed directly and in a nonthreatening way to the person involved. Assertive anger means thinking before you speak, being confident in what you say using facts, yet open and flexible to the ‘other side’. It means being patient; not raising your voice; communicating how you are feeling emotionally, and really trying to understand what others are feeling.

When the person deals with anger assertively, they demonstrate they are mature and care about their relationships and themselves. Their watchwords are courage, calm and clarity about the facts of the situation and their emotions.

So where am I with my grief anger since Trump and his surrogates came into power in January 2017? As I stated previously I have been caught in an obsessive/compulsive loop of shock/disbelief /rage. I better understand now that my shock and disbelief come from an administration that lives and governs by a set of values which are the antithesis of my values of kindness, equality, truth and honesty.

Unable to bear the excruciating pain of that reality, my protectors come roaring out each time Trump et al announce a new atrocity. Rather than accept the loss of moral governance, my parts are rebelling against it with anger. They seek to blame Trump, McConnell, the silent Republican Senators, Trump supporters, anyone wearing a red hat. Those angry parts of me feel a constant sense of injustice, resentment, and rage.

How have those angry parts behaved? Over four years I have written thousands of postcards to Republican members of Congress criticizing them for their support of Trump’s policies and behaviors. I have sent thousands of emails to Republican Senators demanding they stand up to Trump and vote against his vile directives and actions. I have thought and spoken a million expletives to family and friends over each Trump and Republican travesty. I have actually harrumphed with satisfaction each time I heard of a Trump official or supporter testing positive for Covid — 19 hoping they would get really sick, become a long hauler and learn their lesson. My Khan part has actually wished worse.

I have many other parts that are deeply pained by these anger protectors and their actions. I know the protector strategy is intended to shield that little girl inside of me who suffers so with the “mean” people in power, but the tsunami of anger flooding me is sometimes more than I can bear. Remember, I want to be kind.

I desperately want to shift from aggressive grief anger to assertive anger. I want to be like Nancy Pelosi who in my mind epitomizes assertive anger with style and grace. How I wish I could be her in this maelstrom, but I am just not there yet. So I keep looking for someone a bit farther down the road than I am to emulate. I actually found her on Huffington Post.

I am including excerpts of a powerful article written by Jamie Davis Smith that appeared in HuffPost Personal on 11/12/2020.

There is no doubt Smith is in the Trump anger stage of grief, but I admire how she named her feelings and the factual consequences of Trump’s actions and policies to her, her family and community without falling into aggressive anger. Thank you, Ms. Smith, for modeling assertive anger:

No, I Will Not Be ‘Reaching Out’ To Trump Voters, Now Or Ever. Here’s Why. HuffPost Personal: 11/12/2020 Jamie Davis Smith:

As a Jew, an atheist, a woman and the mother of a disabled child, I have watched as my communities have been threatened repeatedly. The day the 2020 election was called with Joe Biden projected to be our next president, I danced in the streets at Black Lives Matter Plaza along with thousands of others who finally felt like this long nightmare was coming to an end.

But almost immediately, we began to hear calls to reach out to Trump supporters to mend fences. Pop star Katy Perry encouraged fans to follow her lead and tell family members who voted for Trump that they are “here for them.” Political scientist Ian Bremmer encouraged Biden voters to reach out to Trump supporters to show empathy. Former Sen. Rick Santorum, who compared same-sex marriage to bestiality while holding office, urged Biden supporters to give Trump and his voters “space” to work through their feelings. These suggestions enraged me.

These calls for unity come from a place of privilege, and they’re coming from mostly straight, white, cisgender people who are financially secure. They may not have liked some of Trump’s policies, but they were not actively harmed by them. They likely never feared for their safety or well-being in Trump’s America.

Before any attempt at “unity” can be made, there needs to be a reckoning, an acknowledgment that so many of Trump’s actions have been unconscionable and do not align with societal ideals that claim to value all life. Building bridges with people who share Trump’s views sends a clear message that you are willing to keep the peace at the expense of the dignity and well-being of those with less power and privilege. . . .

Jews like me were literally slaughtered in their place of worship in my home state of Pennsylvania, where a gunman opened fire on the congregation at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh. The president failed to implement commonsense gun control policies while stoking antisemitism, claiming that “Jews are only in it for themselves.” . . .

As the mother of two daughters, I have spent the Trump years fearing that none of us will have the right to control our own reproductive choices if Trump has his way. . . .

Time and time again, Trump has tried to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. Each time, his administration has put my disabled daughter’s future at risk, along with the futures of millions of other Americans with preexisting conditions. . . .

Over the past eight months, I’ve felt helpless as Trump has failed to control COVID-19. . . . Even though he said at least 40 times that the coronavirus would disappear, it is instead tearing through the country with a vengeance, claiming the lives of two of my family members and making several of my friends and family very ill. . . .

Through all of this, my communities have come together in solidarity with one another to fight against Trump’s hateful acts. We are allies to one another, even when not directly under attack. Those who supported Trump, and those who still do, lack the compassion and the basic decency to recognize that every life has value. I have no need for them in my life and no desire to now pretend that I can accept their views, that any of this was ever OK. . . .

In this moment I am right there with Jamie Davis Smith in that none of this is OK. I just do not want to be Khan.

I found more help when I went back to one of the top five books that changed my life: The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. Julia gives one of the best summaries of anger I have ever read. In fact her description below beautifully captures in a few short paragraphs the process of anger moving from passive aggressive anger to aggressive anger to assertive anger. Cameron writes:

Anger is fuel. We feel it and we want to do something. Hit someone, break something, throw a fit, smash a fist into a well, tell those bastards. But we are nice people, and what we do is stuff it, deny it, bury it, block it, hide it, lie about it, medicate it, muffle it, ignore it. We do everything but listen to it.

Anger is meant to be listened to. Anger is a voice, a shout, a plea, a demand. Anger is meant to be respected. Why? Because anger is a map. Anger shows us what our boundaries are. Anger shows us where we want to go. It lets us see where we’ve been and lets us know when we haven’t liked it. Anger points the way, not just the finger. In the recovery of a blocked artist (person), anger is a sign of health.

Anger is meant to be acted upon. It is not meant to be acted out. Anger points the direction. We are meant to use anger as fuel to take the actions we need to move where our angers points us. With a little thought, we can usually translate the message that our anger is sending us.

When we feel anger, we are often very angry that we feel anger. Damn anger!! It tells us we can’t get away with our old life any longer. It tells us that our old life is dying. It tells us we are being reborn, and birthing hurts. The hurt makes us angry.

Anger is the firestorm that signals the death of our old life. Anger is the fuel that propels us into our new one. Anger is the tool, not a master. Anger is meant to be tapped into and drawn upon. Used properly, anger is use-full.

Sloth, apathy, and despair are the enemy. Anger is not. Anger is our friend. Not a nice friend. Not a gentle friend. But a very very loyal friend. It will always tell us when we have been betrayed. It will always tell us when we have betrayed ourselves. It will always tell us that it is time to act in our own best interest. Anger is not the action itself. It is action’s invitation.

I love Julia’s viewpoint that anger is my friend. Not a nice friend. Not a gentle friend, but a very very loyal friend. My critic relaxes reading those words. I can be thankful when my anger tells me my personal values as a human being have been violated by Trump and his surrogates. I can feel gratitude when my anger tells me my boundaries as a citizen of the United States have been violated. I can be appreciative when my anger tells me it is time to act and points the way to right action. Not a nice friend, not a gentle friend, but a very loyal friend.

I also resonate with Cameron’s statement that anger is meant to be acted upon. It is not meant to be acted out. It often provides us with information that allows us to better engage with the world around us (as well as with ourselves). It can encourage us to focus on what we hope to achieve, rather than merely focusing on the pain, insult, or victimization. It pushes us to fix the wrongs we see in the world and make it right.

Anger, like fire, is a primal force. When left unchecked, it can be destructive, yet when managed and used wisely, it can be a beneficial and powerful instrument that leads to enlightenment. So, I go back to my anger map and try to chart the course towards my end destination: assertive anger. What are the mile markers?

· I need to think before I speak

· I need to be calm

· I need to have courage and confident in the facts

· It means I need to be patient

· I need not raise my voice

· I must communicate how I am feeling emotionally at the deepest level possible

· It means speaking with courage, calmness and clarity with researched facts and named feelings.

Sigh…even knowing where I want to go and the steps to get there, the destination feels far down the road — far down the road but at least I know where I am headed. I have Breathe tattooed on my left forearm. In this moment I feel I should add Courage, Calmness and Clarity to the other.

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Commentary: December 20, 2023

I want to open with two thoughts. The first is that I continue to have a complicated relationship with anger. It remains my greatest challenge seven years after trump took office. The second is I never really know where the 2023 commentaries will take me.

I am surprised — but not really — by a memory I had this morning of an event that happened in early 2018. A client came into session and shared a meeting she had with an energy worker who read her Akashic Records. She was intrigued by several past lives and how those lives were influencing her present life. I was no stranger to energy work and was so taken by my client’s enthusiasm I booked a session to have my Akashic Records read by the same channeler.

An aside: Akashic Records are an [energetic] library of information that contain the details of your soul and its journey. They span through past lives, present incarnations, and future possibilities. The Akashic realm is said to be the highest energetic realm. It holds every single thought, every action, every experience throughout your entire soul journey. It reveals past lifetimes, issues resolved and unresolved in each, purpose in each and most importantly how all are linked together in your unique soul journey in the present moment.

When I participate in readings, I give very little information about myself or why I am there. I have a skeptical part that thinks energy work and practices are mumbo jumbo and readers make up stuff based on what we tell them. So, I said little other than I was curious what my issues were this go round.

The session was 90 minutes long. Here is the bottom line: the reader said I had many many lifetimes as a leader in rebellions, revolutions, and wars against tyranny, oppressive regimes and corrupt governments. She also said I was killed in battle in every lifetime. I laughed when she commented, “Wow your soul has a thing about oppression and social justice.”

Well, there you go. There is the answer about my anger. I have been carrying that wound or mission — depending on how you want to look at it — for lifetimes. While hard core western thinking would scoff, quantum physicists might say, “Of course! Linear time is a false premise. Everything is happening all at once, everywhere. There is no past, present or future. There is just a ton of NOW.”

The idea of parallel timelines/lives and reincarnation is also fodder for the entertainment industry. One only need pay attention to the box office success of movies such as Everything, Everywhere, All At Once, or Spider Man Multiverse, or the Avenger Series. The rupture of the time/space continuum is also a favorite topic across the Gene Rodenberry Star Trek enterprise.

If I stay with the idea of the Akashic Records and my many lifetimes as rebel leader against the corrupt, it is:

· No wonder I am so angry. I have been fighting this battle for millennia,

· No wonder this political landscape feels so familiar. I have parts that know exactly how things are going to happen before they happen,

· No wonder so much of what has been going on since 2016 feels like life and death to me,

· No wonder I am flabbergasted and incensed that others do not see what is so obvious to me — that we are in trouble here, comrades. This thing with trump and the magas is not going to go or end well.

· No wonder I feel people have to take sides; that this is a black and white issue — no grays. You are either a good guy or a bad guy.

While I am being a bit tongue in cheek this morning, I also feel there was a kernel of truth in that past life reading. I do believe our soul is infinite and timeless and returns to continue learning lessons only offered on the Earth plane.

So, drifting in thoughts of Star Trek and past lives is okay in this moment and honestly, it gives me another perspective into why I have struggled so. Perhaps I really have carried those battles into this lifetime. If so, it is no wonder I still feel so angry; not only did I see and feel injustice over and over again, I died before resolution or victory was attained.

Oh my! As I said when I started this morning’s commentary, my relationship to anger is complicated.