“You gotta push through that wall, Wang. You’ve got power, but your holding back. You’re only giving half of your all, like you’re punching not to get hit. But that’s not helping your offense. Whatever that wall is, Wang, you gotta let go and get through it.”
One of the difficult things about writing a blog like this is that it’s all happening in real time. It’s tough to make sense out of the events that are unfolding. You want to think they’re all connected, but you just can’t figure out how, maybe because that scene hasn’t been written yet. Maybe next week, you’ll find your answer.
But I’m impatient. Especially when your psychiatrist — in the last few minutes before your time is up — tells you something you wish you admitted to yourself a long time ago.
“It’s your anger.” I’m sitting there half stunned, half relieved. Finally someone said it. “You don’t allow room for it in your life and it’s popping up in rather unhealthy ways. I think with your BPD, your brain quickly dismisses it, sweeping it under the rug before you can even notice it. You end up with unhealthy coping mechanisms that makes it difficult to function. The meds will help — it will ease out the anxiety attacks — but it won’t make that problem go away.”
Two revelations on separate, unrelated occasions. They’re both asking me to do hard work; to confront something I’ve been running away from all my life, whether I’ve known it or not. Could those two instances mean anything together? Can this hold back my training? If I have to give it my all, does that mean all of me — including my anger — must be acknowledged?
I’ve had a difficult relationship with anger, both expressing and receiving it. When it rears its ugly head, I don’t want it. I don’t own it. It comes out so raw that people don’t forget it. They, in fact, become good stories and lessons of what happens when my anger gets out of hand. They say, “Remember that time? I couldn’t believe you did that!”
I laugh with them, but I also know how afraid I was during those moments, feeling out of control. I remember being in a movie theater, storming out of a heated argument I brought upon myself with some strangers. The husband ran after me, saying, “Hey! You don’t talk to my wife that way!” And in that moment I had lost it, as if I became Robert DeNiro himself in Taxi Driver: Do you really wanna mess with me? Do you really wanna mess with me? Because I don’t think you wanna mess with me. The husband froze. Everyone was scared. I ran away, crying hysterically. They’re so rare but hard to ignore. I do everything in my power to keep that from happening again.
Maybe it’s time. It’s time to deal with my relationship with anger on an honest level. I know I wouldn’t take it on for myself. It’s scary, it makes me vulnerable, it’s my worst enemy. But I also know that if I didn’t do it, it wouldn’t help me become a better fighter — someone who can acknowledge the anger and let it go. I realize now that when I get punched, I do get angry. But I hold that back. I can feel it in my arms, in my shoulders, in my body. I become tight and stiff. I tense up. I hold it in and don’t let it go.
When you don’t have to hold back because of fear, when you’re not afraid to lose control, when you can let go and use it for what it is, you can feel that punch ring true. It comes from the ground up and every part of your body is working together to create one solid, full, sound hit, no matter how quick, how powerful. And the only way to consistently do that is to break down that wall and push through, over and over again. When you’re only working to half of your potential because you’re holding back, the other half is working against you.
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