A Lightbulb Moment

I figured out why I have writer's block.

I've only been feeding the part of me that's angry. So I guess I need to expose this particular shadow so that I can get past it.

Anger is only one part of who I am, but it is certainly not the aspect of my personality that defines my existence. No wonder I've been feeling friggin' drained lately! I'm reacting to the world in a way that doesn't fully reflect who I am.

The echo chamber of the blogs has a lot to do with that I think. The big sites that I visit in Lefty Blogtopia (yes, skippy, I know) are very angry. And rightfully so. There is an abundance of reasons to be righteously pissed off. But. And this is a big but. Where does the anger go when it needs to be released?

I've witnessed it take on different forms over the past couple of years of blogging. One is like a pressure cooker that goes BOOM when the flame gets alittle too high. Instead of seeing food splattered on the kitchen ceiling, this type of anger usually leads to infighting and a chilling of the atmosphere to the point where tiptoe'ing through the tulips becomes an artform worthy of mastery.

The other form of anger is like the slow boil of water needed to make cinnamon tea. It fills the room with an aroma of pleasantry because it has been the evolving status quo (oxymoron alert!) and unless I've removed myself from it for a period of time, I don't even notice that it's there until I've received third-degree burns that don't produce much pain due to lack of nerve endings. This is the type of anger that is getting me down, I think. It's more numbing than anything else.

For me, the antedote is action. It gives me hope and a sense of purpose when I do something concrete to fight against whatever it is I happen to be seething about on a given day. I wish it wasn't such a reactive posture, but I guess that'll have to be the case until some type of sanity is restored in society.

So to make a long post longer, I wrap up with these words from my mentor, Cesar Chavez:

It is possible to become discouraged about the injustice we see everywhere. But God did not promise us that the world would be humane and just. He gives us the gift of life and allows us to choose the way we will use our limited time on earth. It is an awesome opportunity.

Whether it's God, Yahweh, Allah, Indra, the Buddha, Plato's Forms, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, or the Cosmic Muffin; the purpose of my personal recentering today is to let my anger go and use this 'awesome opportunity' to do what I can do according to my abilities to advance my ideals of equality, justice and love.

For now, that involves finishing the paperwork on my desk so my workplace doesn't lose our funding for a financial literacy program that serves the immigrant population of Tucson.

Namaste (y paz)

Crossposted at Human Beams