When I focused on creating a different relationship with my feelings of anxiety and disappointment, I used a lot of self-compassion. I worked on changing my inner dialogue when I was feeling anxious and/or disappointed: “this is what anxiety feels like, it’s okay to feel anxiety, I am safe in this moment, I can feel anxiety and still live my life” “this is what disappointment feels like in my body, I can feel disappointed, nothing has gone wrong here” etc. These seem to work well and allow me to process the emotions in a safe space within myself and release them.

Feelings of anger come up regularly for me. They have since I had kids 10 years ago. I’ve been coached on my anger a lot and do self-coaching as well, which isn’t always productive. I think anger is a very familiar emotion for me even though I don’t like the way it feels. When I’m feeling angry, I find myself ruminating and trying to solve for the anger – “there has to be something I can do to make this anger stop” and when I use the same process of shifting my inner dialogue to thoughts like “it’s okay to feel angry, this is what anger feels like in my body, my anger is here to tell me something, anger isn’t a problem to be fixed” it feels dismissive to my desire to fix it and I resist the shift. I think that I need to hold onto the anger to protect myself, which I can see is doing the exact opposite.

What I have found to be helpful is to redirect my brain, not allow myself to ruminate, and set boundaries with my brain – “if you are going to ruminate, I am going to shut it down and redirect to something nurturing for myself.” My concern is that I’m not processing the anger and trying to justify it by saying it’s caring for myself. I could use some coaching on my intentional model as well as some clarification on if I’m indulging in anger and/or avoiding processing it by redirecting my energy to things that feel more compassionate and kind. I feel like there is something I’m not seeing here.

UNINTENTIONAL MODEL:
C: my ex’s wife, Mandy, emailed me and responded, “please keep in mind that we are heading back from camping that day and will be hauling the camper home. Meeting us halfway or in Allentown would be greatly appreciate”
T: I’m already accommodating them so much (it’s not fair)
F: resentful (anger)
A: ruminate, try to figure out how to get them to stop asking so much of me, overthink ways to say no without having repercussions that impact my boys, resist processing the anger, think about all the ways I’ve already “kept them in mind”, resent all the things I’ve done that have seemingly gone unappreciated by them, talk bad about her to my mom and other people, avoid talking to my ex when I see him at my son’s soccer game, spend lots of time in my head trying to fix an unidentified problem, spin in anger and don’t let go, I ask too much of me, I have unrealistic expectations of myself, I do too much at my own expense
R: I’m not being fair to myself

INTENTIONAL MODEL:
C: my ex’s wife, Mandy, emailed me and responded, “please keep in mind that we are heading back from camping that day and will be hauling the camper home. Meeting us halfway or in Allentown would be greatly appreciate”
T: “I don’t need to solve for this anger right now” or
T: “this isn’t a problem to be solved” or
T: “it’s okay if she thinks I should meet them half way” or
T: “only I get to decide what I am willing to do or not”
F: empowered
A: make a decision what I want to do and have my own back, redirect brain when it wants to entertain other decisions or redecide, trust myself to make the decision that is best for me, communicate firmly but not angrily, don’t allow the repercussions to mean I did something wrong, speak kindly to myself, put phone on DND and don’t answer texts or emails from them unless they are logistical things I want to address, allow myself to process the anger and tears if need be without making it mean I’m weak, don’t make it a problem, let them be wrong about me, let them be who they are, don’t try to change them to feel better
R: I decide what I’m willing to do (not sure about this result)

Thank you!