#3 | angry
(I think I actually don't care about structure anymore. all this time, what i've wanted is to freely write without worrying about what i'm producing or what the people who read it think of me, when writing for me is supposed to feel like a release.)
there are a few things that I've learned about my emotions over the years.
the first and most relevant one is that it's really hard for me to let go of anger. it's a bit of a paradox: when I'm angry, I want to act like I don't care, but I'm only angry because I do.
you could say I'm also very vocal about how I feel - whether it's "too much" (I'm watching the new Lena Dunham show and am realizing how often I think of myself as "too much") is a subjective matter. I would consider myself quite expressive when it comes to my feelings.
anyway, I don't really know where I'm going with this, lol. I wanted to talk about people in my life that I'm angry at. in my life so far, I've had three friendships come to an end over an argument. the first two were because I found out they were saying unkind things behind my back, and the third one is a bit convoluted, but he deeply hurt a mutual friend of ours and I directly told him that I thought he made a mistake. the fallout from that conversation made us realize that we have very different values as people and we've gone our separate ways.
the feelings about the third one are still lingering. I'm quite upset about it. at the time, I didn't say much to him, which is surprising because as I said, I'm usually very vocal about how I feel.
a few quiet months after I criticized him (in a thoughtful way that I considered quite measured), he told me no longer wanted to be friends - a reaction that I thought was disproportionate because everyone else in his life agreed with me and told him as such. I wanted so badly to reply with a long text that said so, but instead I said absolutely nothing and blocked him on everything. after all, that's what he wanted - and if it's what he wanted, then we weren't meant to be friends after all. I accepted that things couldn't change. but if that's true, then why do I still feel angry?
an odd parallel, but I have similar feelings about an ex with whom things ended poorly, even though we broke up a long time ago. when I have uneasy or negative feelings, I look for a direct conversation to truly resolve them, so when a bond in my life ends with an argument, the feeling just lingers and lingers. it has nowhere to go.
I need to see anger as a form of sadness. I'm sad that these people weren't who I thought they were, or rather that we didn't have the bond I thought we had, or rather that our lives have simply drifted apart, or or or...
I can't land on any one conclusion, and that's what makes it so hard. sadness is amorphous and percolates through everything, no matter how hard I try to leave it behind. I wish I could simply accept that life can hurt sometimes, and I'm allowed to feel the pain.