Stop judging your outbursts (and what to do instead)

What I learned when I woke up shouting at the rain

The Boy Who Stopped Listening

I grew up as a child who never paid attention to adults, because every interaction felt like it was either a shout or a judgement on what I was doing. Looking back, I built that into being a lonesome and misunderstood hero. In reality it also meant I built my sense of myself around being the problem. I also promised I would never sound like that. I kept that promise for twenty years.

Twenty-Something, a Baby, a Job, No Sleep

Fast forward to living as a young father, holding onto a job, every priority screaming at maximum volume. Back then there was no category for how I felt, in effect I was a solopreneur juggling client acquisition, customer problems and a young family. Back in the day, the priority order of that description was how life was lived, unquestioningly. The problem is that when everything is urgent, nothing gets chosen. It is one exhausting session of whack-a-mole and all the time essential psychic energy is leaking away.

As long as business metrics are on the up and up then - by definition - everything else must be on the up and up also, right? Except truth be told I wasn't managing my life. I was being dragged through the streets behind it. What is the next non-negotiable interrupt? One afternoon, my body made the decision for me.

The Rain Walk

I am steaming with rage and frustration. Time to remove myself from any situation I simply cannot cope with. I feel smothered, anxious, on hyper alert. This pattern turned up so often it had become my constant companion. Time to go out for a walk, relieve some of the pressure, try to grasp onto something - anything - that would let me rest, breathe, orient myself. My son is hungry and there is no food to be found. Time to walk to the store.

Except now it is raining. A soft October rain, the kind that has you more wet than if you had been swimming. I must have paused beneath a tree, leaning against a wall, for shelter. All I recall was waking up with a terrible jolt. It may have been seconds, less even, suddenly I came crashing back into my own body with what felt like terrible force, and all I could hear was shouting. Except it was me that was shouting, out loud. In a voice I had not heard in two decades.

Hearing the voice of my parents coming out of my mouth, the words, the tone, had a terrific impact and a stark realization flashed into consciousness. What that childhood lonesome hero heard was not a criticism, it was transformed into a plea from an exhausted and loving caregiver for even a moment's respite.

The Past Rewrites Itself

What happened next was like a film scene, like an old railway departures board, the mechanical kind, where each letter or symbol flutters right through its entire sequence, only to settle eventually on a new symbol. The change percolated right across the image in this way, and in that moment my past was re-written.

That is the only way I can describe it. I felt overwhelmed by empathy (and grief ?) for the past, of how events in themselves mean nothing other than a perception that is given to them, and in that moment all sense of past or future disappeared forever.

What Your Exhaustion Is Actually Shouting

Snapping, shouting and shutting down are not character flaws. They are distress signals. Consider that they may in fact be parts of you that are desperately trying to help in the only way they know how, by shielding you from a perceived burden.

1. Notice what is happening and treasure that tiny gap between noticing and judging.

2. If possible, stay open and kind, as you would with a tiny wounded creature.

3. Creating that gap and abiding there will open up and let you know exactly what needs to be done next.