When my mental connections go haywire the madman within me attacks. My mind gets intense, like an intense stream of water from a fire hose holding back a crowd, and I get into an overheated mind. My aggressive impulses explode out of my mouth. My aggression can be consuming, lots of cussing, and then I get addicted to my aggression. I feel addicted to my ranting and raving within my thoughts. A large part of my difficulty is I live too much in isolation, as people teach me a quiet awareness and they teach me my thoughts are not that important after all. It seems I need people to help let go of my burning rage, otherwise my delusions of my thoughts become consuming. When I get addicted to my thoughts there is nothing left to which I can attach myself. To be honest these thoughts are based on lots of faithlessness or darkness.
My faithlessness does not allow me to understand self-surrender and self-possession that allows me to be effortlessly myself, quiet and still. So what is this leap into the unknown, no thoughts? Is there a place where there is enough being to be still? What is this awareness without clinging to thoughts?
Hey syd, on occasion I have had that same difficulty, especially in the first two years of recovery. I have a right frontal lobe injury and it has made such a mess out of my emotions. Its wicked, and in a way, unpredictable. One remedy though that I have found to relieve this stressful way of thinking, is music. When music isnât doing it for ya, in my case, meditation can serve as a good alternative.
To be honest, my mental volcano of sporadic anger may never calm down, but the best thing the both of us can do is enjoy the good moments and face the shitty ones when they arrive.
Thanks for your insights and yes meditation does seem to help break this addiction to thoughts.
When I read your words and your unfailing insight I could see my mind observing how I react to disappointment. When my natural mental processes become complex and exhausting my nervous system becomes high-strung and then I react. For reasons beyond me, when my mind is against the wall and I feel this enormous stumbling block of being stupid, where nothing is clear or certain, anxiety increases. Then my worrier and the fighter comes boiling out. So it seems like you are saying it takes this awareness to observe the âgoodâ and this awareness to observe the âshifty.â
Thanks for your insight, your open mind and your perceptiveness. Your original ideas are valuable for me and your insight is on target.
Thanks Occipital for your information and I do get caught in emotional reactions, even these beliefs about my deficiency. It is strange when I need to speak on my feet I cannot communicate clearly to others. Everything is complex and a stream of consciousness floods in where others cannot follow my train of thought. I will jump from one point to another without indicating any steps in my logic. Then my nervous system tunes to high-pitch and my unconscious impulses erupts in my mind. The dilemma is I can get obsessed with my aggression, unable to act, madman attacks inside and then everything goes haywire. The mental exertion is exhausting and clearly the trip is never worth the effort.
If people communicate my value as being ânothingnessâ the rage will just burn inside me. For some reason nothingness communicates nothing true or valuable, nothing in the world to identify with, nothing left and I become extremely filled with rage. Family has communicated my nothingness, time-and time again, and my mind will become intense. My feelings will become overheated and I will erupt with aggressive impulses, which repels them from me. For some reason ânothingnessâ makes me extremely cynical about the value of ever relating to anyone, especially family, and I have created lots of hurt feelings.
When I feel true craziness my mind is attracted to the darkness. And maybe if I could learn to not attach my existence based on anything then maybe a light could be offered to my emotional reaction.
I am exhausted, as you understand, and thanks again.
Hey Syd,
A bit like you, in pressure situations, I tend to have a similar emotional reaction rather than a calm logical. I speak my mind and âcall a spade a spadeâ where I would be better of calling it a digging implement. I had a female boss repeatedly attack me and I did not respond at all but took the abuse for a long time. Sheâd make snide little comments and being the only male worker of 15 employees I did not feel it right to respond. Then one day after a comment I reacted explosively and she played the role of victim, despite the fact Iâd been her victim many times and not said anything officially. My reaction was âover the topâ for her single statement, but when combined with her former comments was well proportioned. I was exhausted by her personal attacks. She made a complaint to her bosses. Other staff were in support of me as they could see her actions, but her bosses were unaware of the ongoing attacks on me. I asked her bosses to speak to the other staff about her actions but she told them it was not required and I was unceremoniously dismissed.
I feel that had I acted on the initial incident (and each preceding attack) rather than absorbing them, trying to move on, my reaction would not have been as explosive. But by bottling these incidences up my reaction was seen as disproportionate and therefore a direct attack on her. I find that when I become overwhelmed my logical train of thought becomes disconnected and although its origins are logical, trying to communicate it is impossible and it is seen as an illogical rage.
Now, I try to break these reactions down in to steps, so that I donât become overwhelmed and can think and explain in a more orderly fashion, rather than it building to an explosive reaction. Does that make sense??
Merl
Yes, Merl, it does make sense to break the reactions into steps, rather than being overwhelmed. This is good awareness, as I can lose the forest for the trees also. When I get overwhelmed with too many trees my fear of being violated is fulfilled. When my mental world becomes filled with more anxiety and then âdangerâ is on my mind. And for some reason, this danger splits my consciousness into two parts: me against them, the known and the unknown, and the dangerous and the safe. Then my mental aggression tends to overpower my mind and creates these sharp split between me and the rest of the world. I will become obsessed with defending myself from potential threats from the environment. âNothingnessâ becomes fulfilled and then I become cynical about all relationships, even the value of humanity itself.
It is hard looking at this and yet I need to observe my patterns, so I can get back in touch with reality. You have provided a key for understanding my whole aggressive picture and thank you.