Harnessing the Fire Within: Transforming Anger into Empowerment

Welcome back to The Circle, the podcast where we go all in on men's work, embodiment practice, and personal growth from our queer perspective. If you haven't already, please be sure to give us a follow, like, review, and subscribe. Today, we're diving into the fire of anger, how it moves through the body, and how men's work can help us use it as a tool for transformation rather than a force of destruction. Tim, are you ready to go all in?

I hope so. I am. I am. Alright. Well, let's go.

Yeah. So anger is pretty powerful. It's a pretty powerful emotion, pretty primal, and often misunderstood. It could be seen as something to be avoided or controlled, but can we reframe it as something valuable? So Tim, my first question is, how do you view anger in your work and in your practices?

I believe that anger is an emotion that we all have, which is kind of silly because all emotions are available to all of us. It is part of our human experience, we've talked about that many times. But anger is interesting because it is really powerful, and we have conceptions around it. And for men, we are allowed to experience anger because it its outward expression is very often strong and big and bold and synonymous with kinds of strength and power that we really value in this moment in our life and in our culture. But we also haven't been modeled.

Many of us, most of us, have not been modeled modeled healthy conscious anger and a process of that or been given tools or resources to sort of understand this emotion. So we, this week, had two circles talking about anger. And many of the men indicated that one of their struggles with anger was a feeling as if they were failing because they were angry. And I was, you know, sort of reflecting back that might be in large part because we don't have the tools to start to deal with our anger when it is manageable. We kind of only understand anger in its biggest, most vibrant sort of rageful sometimes form.

And then, of course, from that perspective, anger is entirely bad, and we all sort of agree that it doesn't have a place here or that it shouldn't be here. But when we think of anger as existing on a spectrum like every other emotion, You know, we have been very sad or a little sad. We've been you know, we all are familiar with so many different kinds of love and the intensity of that love. Right? Anger isn't different, but without tools or conversation around it, it can be this thing we only see at, like, a nine or a 10.

And so from a nine or a 10, we have, like, an opinion about it. So I think when we start to connect to anger and the fullness of the experience of anger and the possibility of anger and have tools to meet it, it can actually be a very motivating force. And I have had moments in my life where people have made me angry, and I channeled that anger into action in a healthy or fruitful way. And from that, oh, it motivated me to exceed their expectations. And in so doing, I achieved a goal I wanted to achieve or, you know, things like that.

So I think the possibility of anger being a conscious motivating factor exists, but I think we need to have a conversation around our ability to experience this emotion, our recognition that this emotion isn't just rage, and tools to need it when we start to experience it.

And so what I heard you say is that anger is a pretty natural emotional response and it sits on a spectrum. It can range from like, I'm mildly irritated to I'm in a full rage. And what we're striving to do through men's work and embodiment practice is to bring a little bit of awareness to when that emotional response starts to be triggered. When am I triggered and it's minor irritation versus when am I triggered and it's a full blown rage? So I'm curious, what are some of the

things that you perceive that can trigger anger in you? I believe anger is an indication that one of our boundaries is being has been violated or is being violated or on the precipice of being violated. So when I'm having that experience, I start to think about, well, what what is happening in this moment? So can you can you restate your question one more time?

Yeah. So I'm I'm I guess, what can anger signify? Right? And like, what are those things? You just started talking about boundaries.

So like, you know, a cross boundary can create that emotional response of anger.

So what's interesting is, you know, one of the reasons in men's work we talk about boundaries and edges is understanding our capacity, what we're willing to accept, what we're not. But we often don't know that. So with anger, we I think a lot of people can have and have had the experience of, I'm feeling really angry and I'm not even entirely sure why. I think when we do this exploration, we can start to recognize, oh, I'm feeling angry about a situation or a person or or a something. And I can inquire, okay.

Well, like, what is happening? And there's real power in, oh, that person is on the precipice of crossing a boundary, or they are they are pushing my limit to the place where I may not be able to maintain my composure. What if I were aware enough to notice that and then take conscious action in that moment instead of waiting until they have fully pushed me over, which they may or may not intend to do, And then I am in full reaction where everything is red and intense when it may be the case that they didn't do it on purpose and they they didn't realize they were crossing a boundary because I wasn't aware that it existed.

Being able to have the awareness to then be able to work with it, to say like, Okay, hey, there's a boundary right here and I'm starting to get a little flared. I'm starting to feel maybe a little bit of heat in my body. I've experienced anger as a very fiery emotion. So I start to experience heat. I start to really I can feel my blood pressure rising.

So just being aware of those bodily sensations, that somatic experience that's happening inside of my body can give me enough of a little bit of a pause to be like, Okay, what's happening here? Is it a boundary? Is it another suppressed emotion? Could it be an injustice that I'm feeling, a betrayal? Maybe there's a frustration or a powerlessness that I'm experiencing.

What is happening in my field right now that is causing my body to start to feel this way?

I love that you said that because this is why embodiment practice, yogic practice is so important. It creates a dialogue with our body to get the signals. And anger, those signals tend to be pretty big. I'm I'm red in the face. I'm hot.

I'm agitated. Some people, me in particular, I feel like a digestive sort of stomach y kind of experience when I'm when I'm having anger. And so if we can tap into that, we can start to, oh, wait. I'm starting to feel this thing. Can I take a look?

Can I can I start to become curious about why why am I starting to feel this agitation or this heat? So our ability to reconnect to our own body and our sensations can be an indication that I am nearing anger without being overcome by it.

Yeah. Something has tripped the wire, right, and has caused this sensation to happen inside of my body. And now it's like, okay, before I let the entire thing explode, can I go in and identify what it is and prevent the full destructive force from being unleashed?

Right. And what's important to remember is that anger and full rage or full protective engagement isn't always bad. So I wanted to bring this there's a the teaching in yoga of Ahimsa, non harming, as I understand it, is to cause the least amount of harm possible whenever possible. And, you know, a yogi will work hard to consider that in in as many ways as they can. That could mean physically attacking, restraining, or potentially even murdering, a gunman who is capable in that moment of mowing down, you know, any number of people.

Now I suspect any yogi, myself included, would prefer not to take that action if they could. But in that moment, some righteous or justifiable anger would be fuel in service to a higher good. Right? So so when we think about anger, I don't want us to think about anger as a bad thing. I want us to think about it as a thing that needs to be respected, understood, and worked with.

And I think the example I used last night, which I really like I just made it up, by the way, but no one's mad that the stove is hot, that it's either electric heat or or flame. No one's mad about that. But we all understand, oh, this has a purpose and a and a a place in here, but it demands our attention. And, you know, even, you know, regular cooks and and parents who do this all the time, remember, I have to be mindful. I have to watch where I'm putting my hands.

I have to watch that part of the pot if it might be hot. I have to be mindful of these things. I think anger is the same. I'm not mad at anger in the way that I'm not mad at the stove, but I have to use it mindfully. And then, you know, with the stove, we have understandings.

Well, where do I put the the pot handle? You remember that, like, thing for kids, like, the pot handle should be away so they can't grab it and all this stuff. We need a same set of tools to approach and work with anger because anger isn't going anywhere.

Yeah. I love that analogy so much because it's like I don't when I'm cooking, like, I'm not ignoring the flame. Right? Like, I'm very aware that the flame exists, and then I leverage it to accomplish what I'm trying to accomplish. Right?

I would argue you're even grateful Yeah. That it's there because of what you're trying to accomplish Absolutely. When placed consciously.

Yes. Mhmm.

So exactly.

Right. But not ignoring it. Right? Like, even if I've even if I've gotten burnt before by my stove, I I do not ignore the heat of that stove. Sometimes I might get a little unconscious of it and I may be a little in my own world or somewhere else and I'm not thinking about it and I get a little bit forgetful of it or I'm just not paying full attention and then I might get a little burn.

I might grab the handle of that pot and be like, Oh, that's hot. I forgot. Right? Because I wasn't bringing my awareness to it. But, you know, not not ignoring it, not pretending like it doesn't exist.

It's there, and it's serving a purpose.

Well, and the nature of this particular emotion is that it will immediately remind you. So you grab the pot, a little you were a little distracted. You were you know? And you will be reminded immediately. Anger is big and powerful and has a tendency to remind us quickly when we become unconscious of it.

I think that feels true in my in my observation and personal experience.

Yeah. I wanna go back to the example you gave of the active shooter, right? And using conscious rage to take action. And so I think it's a very scary example, but I actually think that it's a good example to work through because it can help us to identify some of the things in which anger can signal. So I start to think of anger can signal an unmet need.

So in that case, I have an unmet need for safety. So all of a sudden triggered, right? I've got this thing that's inside of me that's alive. I also think of, you know, if that gunman is coming in, I think that it's an injustice. It's a betrayal.

It's a betrayal of our shared understanding of common spaces and how we are going to interact as a society and the politeness and the way that we should treat people.

Respect for life.

Respect for life. So now all of a sudden, I'm reacting to that. Anger is signaling that there is a misalignment of my values with theirs. And so I think it actually starts to help us in an extreme example understand some of the things that can have an angry response. Right.

And it is an intense example, but it allows us to understand that even anger at a 10 isn't necessarily bad. So I get nervous about people putting value judgments on emotions at certain intensities, but rather think about them in the context and with conscious awareness and application. So it may be the case that anger at a 10 only has a very few specific circumstances in which it is appropriate, but it still has some. There is no that's all bad when we think about the emotional human experience that we're all talking about here.

There are some times though that I've experienced in my life growing up. Like I was a very reactive, emotionally unregulated child. My emotions were very large. And so what maybe would have been a minor irritant or a one or a two on the anger scale to some children was a full 10 for me. So I think trying to find ways in which to kind of bring that down a little bit, bring that dial down so that my reaction isn't as large and so that I can understand what a 10 looks like and when it might be appropriate to go to that 10 versus how do I regulate myself a little bit more so that the minor infractions don't become a 10?

Well, this is why we need people who can model it and to give us tools because the child needs guidance. They need communication. They need tools. They need to understand boundaries. And but it is not the child's responsibility as far as I understand it to be able to figure that out in that moment.

Oh, I'm irrationally angry right now, and now I need to, you know, engage my own tools. No. The child needs a guardian to help them understand what their experience is. And I think most of us didn't have that. So first and foremost, the the child that you described, your your young self, like, you know, dear young Eric, right, wasn't doing anything wrong, was was trying to figure out their their experience and and was needing guidance in that.

And that guidance could be stern, you know, if it needs to be from a from a guardian. But context around anger is okay, but this is too much. Like, these feelings are valid. Like, here's some stuff we can do. And that's why we're having the conversation.

So now because everybody in the circle last night and the night before, agreed that they didn't have a really healthy model of anger, and they weren't taught tools to navigate it. Every single person in the circle in the last two days now this is a, you know, small sample, but everyone agreed. So that leads me to believe, and based on other observations that I've had in working with lots of men in different ways, I do not believe most of us have had that modeled. And so how do we learn it?

Well, I'm curious. I have a pretty clear understanding from my own experiences and my own family, right? Like what uncontrolled anger looks like or unconscious anger, right? Like me, myself as a non rational kid, like going with big reactions. My father is a very angry person, self claimed.

That is one of his crutches. He loves to use it. I'm angry because my father was angry. I was like, Okay, great, cool. But also, let's him off

the hook.

Right. So I've seen lots of modeled you know, unconscious anger. But I'm curious, like, what does the conscious use of anger look like? Like, if you were to model that for me, what would it look like?

Well, I feel like I have modeled it for you. I can't remember when this was, but we were recording an episode and we were in a different understanding of what we were talking about, and I I got angry. Right? But what did I do? I paused.

I stood up. I shook. I said, I think we need to take a break. I stepped away. Right?

That's one example. I I don't even I'm not even gonna suggest that that was the best way. Maybe there were even better ways to do it. But I've had teachers of mine, my teacher, Amir Kalighi. I was in a retreat.

We were gonna go into a sweat lodge. And I had this image of what this sweat lodge was gonna be, and I thought it was gonna be like a big sauna. And I was like, it's gonna be hot. And I don't like it when it's hot, but I can can deal with hot. And then I get there, and we're all like all these men that I've been training with, we're all in our bathing suits sort of ready to go in every you know?

And I see this hut. I don't It's not a hut. I don't you know, it's a lodge, and it's like four feet tall and completely dark. And I start I'm like, wait. So I start looking.

I'm like, are there stairs? Do we go down? Like, is, you know, is this a stairwell down? You know? It turns out, no.

It is not a stairwell down. It is a very short, very cramped space into which lots of men wearing almost no clothes come in. And then some guy, hopefully you trust him, starts pitchforking in fired lava rock

Mhmm.

To heat this room really intensely. And then when when that's all done, they close the door and it's pitch black. Oh my gosh. And my claustrophobia, what I was like. And I went in and I was like I was sitting next to Amir.

Amir was like, come sit next to me. This will be fine. And then at one point, I'm like, I can't do this. Anyway, long story short, I left and then felt like a failure

and

was out there so mad. And I was like, I'm gonna fucking leave. Like, fuck this shit. Like, someone should have told me this blah blah blah, you know, clearly in a full trigger. And then a friend of mine came out and talked to me, and I was like, I'm leaving.

I'm done. Like, fuck this. I hate you know. Mhmm. Know?

And then finally, America do it. And I was like, I need to talk to you. And he was like, okay. And we went into his room, and he was steady enough to take me through a process, a process that included me grabbing a pillow and screaming and, like, punching and moving this energy through me. And then I really like telling the story because I had that moment, and I was like I was and I'm like, okay.

I wasn't fully calmed, but I'm like, okay. Enough to leave and leave the room and say, okay. I'm not leaving. I can do this. And then the next day, so many things happened that, like, allowed for, like, healing and transformation.

But it was because he was able to stand there with me, see me, like, raging at him. Like, you should have fucking told me this, you know, like, this was your responsibility, blah blah blah blah. And, of course, I'm, like, raging at him because he's every man that never told me all the things I needed to know. Right? And he was able to hold it, breathe with me, lead me through a thing, and move the charge.

And from that, I stayed and then had transformational healing. So I think when we think about dealing with anger, well, can you have a person who can watch the storm happen and then and stay? And not he didn't storm back at me. He didn't match me with, you know and I wasn't I wasn't attacking him in the sense of, like, I wasn't criticizing him. I was kind of expressing my own but he he was a steady force.

That, I think we all need that, and we need we need space to to recognize that that's helpful. We need the space to recognize the extent to which we can do that, and we also need space to recognize that in our attempt to do that, we may fail.

And thank you for sharing that example and walking us through it. I mean, being in that moment, it sounds like to me that there was almost a betrayal. Walked into a situation and were either expecting something or there was I think you said it like you should have told me. We should have been aware of what we were walking into because

Up until five minutes before that happened, I had no clue that my claustrophobia was about to be triggered. Yeah. It just never I thought, oh, I'm gonna have to sit through the heat and, like, kind of breathe and, like, manage that. I'm because I'm, like, a very fiery person. Like, that's gonna be hard for me.

Claustrophobia was never on my radar. And then suddenly it was like front and center. Like, you are you are gonna be trapped in a dark space with like lava rocks.

Yeah. Like, I can I could I could trust the situation that I had presented in my head? Right? However, right, like, you are presenting a new vision for me that I do not trust. There is now a betrayal.

Right? Like, this was not what I signed up for.

Be clear, by the way, I want to go a little deeper into the details. This is the lava rocks existed in the center of this round sort of, like, low yurt. Right? And they I think there was, like, a little row of rocks, I can't quite remember, into which these rocks were. But I'm like, oh, if I had been at a different part of the circle and it was pitch black, I could have inadvertently crawled over, like, lava rocks that had just been fired.

I mean, it was it was kind of a really like, a legitimately scary position even if you don't have claustrophobia. Yeah.

And I I and I'm I'm I'm tracking this because it's like there's so many things that you stand for. Or you stand for safety of bringing people into awareness of the experience that they may be going through. And by you seeing that situation, you're like, this is actually unsafe. This could potentially be very dangerous. That's a value of yours.

And this entire experience pushed you to that edge, that boundary of like, I do not agree that spaces should be unsafe. And to me, the space is unsafe, so I'm feeling anger towards it and also claustrophobia and also right?

Yeah. And you're describing it very well. I will say in generosity to my teacher and the experience that he's creating, if claustrophobia isn't a thing, it may not register, and you might need someone to bring it to your awareness. So I can understand how a very well intentioned person could think we're just gonna go in here and, like, do the spiritual practice. And they're not thinking, well, what if I have to crawl out of here?

And will I burn myself on, you know, volcanic rock in the process? Because that isn't that isn't a fear he's got. It's not on his radar. So I wanna be really generous about that. I was angry, I think justifiably so, And I think that he heard me when I expressed it.

But I I I just want to be clear. I I still think he was doing his best to create a safe container.

And this is this is not a jab at that. I'm just I'm and I'm valid I want to validate that, the emotion, the anger, super justified by saying there are these things that what I'm hearing are certain things that you hold dear that were not like, respected in a way. Right? And it may not have anything to do with him. Right?

Like his right? This is just like this is your experience. And

Well, is the importance, I think, of, like, understanding our edges, our boundaries, our capacities, and how we can utilize it. Because I wasn't aware until that moment, oh, I really value the ability to leave whenever I need to. In that moment, it became clear, oh, I I don't feel like I can leave if I need to, and now I have an experience of that. And in this moment, my experience was fear and anger. Yeah.

Yeah.

And both of those things are survival mechanisms, right? And I think that's a lot of what we're talking about is how do we recognize when something is triggering or starting to encroach upon our survival instincts. And we meet it with anger as a signal to ourselves to be like, Hey, I don't like that. Something about that doesn't align with who I am. And then from there, what conscious action can I take?

Right. And so just to complete the story then, because I think it's relevant now that what you after what you just said, the agreement the next day was that I was gonna go back and do it again. But I had spoken about my need for a certain amount of control in order to feel safe, so I was going to be the man pitchforking the stones. And and then that meant that I could be right by the door. And then if I needed to, I could I I had agency to open the door and and pop out if I needed.

Whereas where I was the first night, I was a few men down, and it would have meant crawling in the dark over their laps. Now in where I was seated, to be clear, there was no threat of me crawling on the rock. But if I had been in a different place, there might have been. And so that was the arrangement, and I was gonna go ahead and do it. I did the training to to put the rocks in because you have to be careful.

Yeah. Mean You know?

These are lava rocks that we just took out of the fire. And then later in that experience, I learned that there was another man who was gonna do it who had arguably equal or greater claustrophobia than I have. And because of all the work that we had done, I said to to Amir, I said, you know, I think the best course right now is to let him do it. And so I approached him, talked to him about it. He agreed, and I think the greatest good was served.

So two days later, I felt like an enormous amount of growth and transformation had happened, but in part because anger came up and I had someone who was capable of holding it

and allowing me to work through it. And and modeling, like, how to work with somebody through that intense emotion. And so

now Before you go on, because I know you're about to just because anger could have could have made me leave, but I know I would have had a feeling about that. There would have been a part of me that would have felt justified in leaving because I was justifiably angry. There would have been another part of me that had felt like I quit or I would have maybe shame and all this other stuff. The process of being able to be as angry as I was and then have a conscious practice to work through it, I think, was the thing that got me to that place that felt really good. If I had gotten to a car, which I could have done, and left, I I would have felt justified.

I also know I would not have felt as good as

I ended up feeling. And being able to sit with it and work through it and then allow it to be discharged through you and then channeled into a learning opportunity and an opportunity for growth. Beautiful. And so with a lot of this work, it really is you teach me, I teach somebody else. It's kind of like the lineage aspect of it of you were modeled something and now you have the opportunity to now model that.

So now curious, if a man came to one of your circles struggling with explosive or repressed anger, where would you start in helping to work with it?

I would need a more specific question because I suspect lots of men come to circle. Circles, mine or others, and they are struggling with anger. So are you asking me about someone who's getting explosively angry in Circle, or they are coming to Circle to help work on

their anger? Okay. Let's start with let's let's break this down then. So let's say it's a personal one on one coaching client who's specifically coming to you because, hey, I've recognized that I have some tendencies towards explosive anger. I may have some repressed anger.

Like, I wanna work with you. Where do we start?

I would start by becoming curious about how like, where they start to feel anger and how. What makes you angry? What? And start to look for patterns. You know, typically, I can get angry.

This is an example in the circle. Like, oh, someone cuts me off in traffic. I can get angry about that. But is it a pattern of mine? A lot of the men in the circle, it is a pattern of theirs.

And I'm not me personally, Tim, I am not quick to road rage. It doesn't seem very, like, fruitful or, you know, useful in any way. Doesn't bother me super, like, a lot. So what what creates anger in you repetitively over and over and over again? Where do where do you find it?

And then how do you experience it? So step one would be recognizing, oh, I get angry every time someone speaks to me this way. Once we start to identify those things, you can say, okay. Well, what I'm hearing is that you get angry a lot when someone speaks to you in a particular way. And then we start to go the next level.

Like, well, what's underneath that? And what's underneath that is, are you feeling disrespected? Are you feeling unheard? Are you feeling unseen? And we start to get we start going to the root.

And, you know, with the yoga practice, my teachers always said yoga is a radical practice because we are looking for the root. We're looking for the root of what's happening and to address the root. And this is the same idea. So so you might think, don't like it when people talk to me in a certain way. Chances are that's not the root.

And the root is, oh, you don't you feel disrespected or you feel unheard or you feel, you know, mistreated, whatever

the thing is. An unmet need.

Yeah. And then we start to get deeper and deeper. What's that thing? Okay. And when we when we have a sense of what that thing is and how it occurs in our body, then we can start to first look at it and recognize it, but then also start to work with that.

So when that happens, here's this tool or practice or this tool or practice that you can start to work with because it doesn't mean it's gonna stop annoying you, bothering you.

Okay. We take that.

Right. You don't have to be you don't have to be a reaction to it.

Right. Like, I go back to, like, me as a child, like, can I take that 10 down to a two?

Right? The

thing is still going to happen that is going to create some anger inside of me. There's going to be an anger reaction. But instead of that thing, let's just take, you know, somebody cuts me off in traffic. Instead of me going all the way to a 10

Mhmm.

How can I, next time it happens, maybe go to a two?

Yeah. But that's really generous. I think we are saying, if you're at a 10, can I get you to an eight? And just that space, you might be able to think about, well, what is the consequence of that thing I want to do so badly? I wanna scream at you.

I want to lay on my horn. I want to block you on something. You know? And that space allows you to be like, do I really wanna do that? Even the space to be like, should I put my phone down and go, like, lay down for a minute, put some music on?

So, yes, ideally, ten to two. I love that. Like, also smart driving. Right? Yeah.

Yeah. But I think I think, additionally, reducing it any amount to create a little bit of space will help most of us not make a rash decision that we will then regret. Thank you.

I think that's really valuable to start there and working your way down the ladder, so to speak. The next part of the question, what happens if there's somebody that comes to circle that has an experience similar to the one that you had? How do you think you would handle that today?

If a person came and had an experience similar the one that I had with Amir, I would hopefully meet them in the way that he met me. Deep presence groundedness, curiosity, allowance. So to start with this, Amir never once indicated that my emotions weren't welcome. Right. And he never said, I don't or I don't remember if he was like, your anger is welcome here.

It's allowed. But I felt that. So I'm like, okay. I think I would meet it with with those things.

Powerful, like the allowance of it, the recognition of it. We're not going to ignore this. We're not going to try to suppress this. We're going to try to move it. It is welcome here.

I will say, and that it's the moving of it that I think is so powerful for men. And I talked about this, you know, there is a physiological cascade of things that happen when we start to experience emotions and anger. Like, our nervous system and our endocrine system start to prepare us in in different ways. And the moving of it is so important with movement, with breath. It's why we feel better when we box, which I want you to talk about in a second, or do a killer workout or take a long walk or, you know, any number of things.

I was in an a retreat where another man got triggered, and the response was some version of sacred combat. He was given the opportunity to push up and exert force against a person who was exerting force back and working through that emotion in this safe way to move it. And then from that moving of it, enough space had been created that he was able to step into a powerful choice. I don't wanna go deeper into these details about that, but that ability to move it in a safe, conscious way allowed for a powerful choice that served the greatest good for all. And that, I think, is what we're going for.

Allowance, movement, not repression, not ignoring. It's part of why I box. And I've shared this in both circles that one of the practices that I have found most useful in my conscious channeling of aggression and anger is boxing. And I do it in a way that I'm creating a safe container for myself to be able to play with those emotions in a way. I'm not going boxing because I'm currently angry.

I go boxing and I set myself up a container. Total workout is 12 rounds with three rounds of boxing in each of those. 12 sets, three reps.

I don't know. So it's 12 rounds.

Yeah. So there's 12 rounds of boxing and then there's three

sets in each round. Sure. I'm y'all, I'm

as you can clearly tell, like, I'm not the one to talk fitness. Like, I I know the math, but I don't know the names. Okay. Don't know the the things. I have the whole thing is 12, and then each of those 12 is three.

Got it. Yeah. So, yeah, we'll say each round Yeah. Has three sets

Yeah.

And you do 12 rounds. Yes. 12 rounds. Altogether. Yes.

Yeah. So thirty thirty six sets. Yes. Got it. And how long is the set?

A minute.

And what do you do in that minute?

So it's different boxing combinations, Jab cross, Jab cross hook, and they build in progression. So what happens is the first round is usually one one to two punches. And then the second round will incorporate one

to two more. When you say, like, kinds of punch. Yeah. So jab, cross. And then a

hook, and then an uppercut. Yeah. So and then different places where it may be like a body or a head. So different areas that they could be placed. And so what that progression allows though is that, again, I'm not going into boxing to say, I need to move energy because I'm angry.

It's like, I'm going to create a container in which my aggression can slowly build. And so then through that, as I'm starting to move my body in a way that is really forceful, the natural heat starts to rise. There may be a memory that pops up. There may be something that pops up that allows me to start to build up that intensity, that aggression starts to build, that anger can start to build. And then I have that set time, that time container where I can go there and then I come down.

And then I go there and then I come down.

So you're working with it as if you're in a workshop.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think that's what we a lot of the practice we do is that very thing. I put myself in a safe place with structure so that I can relax into that. And I think the time structure that you just mentioned allows you to ramp up and ramp down without you and then you start to experience, well, what does it feel like to to be to be connected in this way at an at a six and then a seven and then an eight. Right.

And so the more you do that, the more you're gonna be able to move through your life and realize let's say something happens fast. Like, oh, I immediately went to an eight. Well, without any context, you're you're kind of at the whim. Right? But with what you're describing and what we do in embodiment work and yogic practice is, oh, I went from zero to an eight fast, and I have a sense of how I how I am at an eight and what happens if eight turns to nine so I can start to make some choices immediately so that I I can be the most conscious person I can be.

And with me, that's still probably very red faced and very passionate, but it's controlled or conscious.

And I can go as I'm building up, I start to understand where also that line exists, where I go into red rage, where I go into destructive anger. And I can start to become very aware of that. And if I do allow myself to cross over that, if I'm in a flurry, I'm round eight and I am just feeling it and something has unlocked and I am just going to town on that bag and I'm like, Rah! Coming back down. Coming back to myself allows me then if in the real world something does bring me up, I know that I can come down.

I can go there and then I can just kind of bring myself back. I can come back down to ease. We just talked with Julian about this right, of coming back to ourselves.

Mhmm. Yeah. Yeah. I think that is an unbelievably valuable skill that most of us need to bring awareness to and increase practice and to have a community where we can talk about that. Because in the practicing of it, as in the practice of anything, we are going to fail.

That's the idea of why we practice. We're like, can I test the limit, see if I can do it? Oh, I got it wrong. I got it wrong. Oh, now I got it right.

You know, that idea. And so can we engage in that with this emotion that sometimes feels like we have limited permission. And and if we get it wrong, we can immediately feel like a failure. So what if you didn't? What if what if I could talk to someone who was also on their journey of deepening their understanding and engagement with anger, And I could get their reflection without me thinking, well, if I tell them that I messed up, what if I told them I got a little unskillful in that moment, they were gonna think I'm a whatever and everything's gonna crumble.

And instead, oh, no. Here's a man where I can say, I was doing pretty well, and then this happened, and I got too sharp with my kids or with this colleague or whatever the thing. You know? Because that's the moment of growth. Oh, so what I heard was, what what could you do next time?

And we're suddenly in a process that I think is of benefit to all people.

Absolutely. Being able to really share in that experience and and recognize that, like, many of us, myself, I'll just speak to myself, like I was ashamed of my anger. Anger was used as a way to shame me. You are bad if you are angry. And I looked at the world that way too.

Looked at still this day, I'm working through it. Like I think of my father. Right? It's a very angry man. And I think of him as a bad man.

And I'm still working through that today. And I'm still trying to unpack that today so that I can work towards forgiving him while also working on myself and my own relationship with my anger. And the allowance that I don't have to suppress my anger, that I can express it, and that I can then talk with other people about it.

I think I'm listening to an audiobook right now that reminded me of this concept where I think we will all benefit, especially when it comes to anger, when we start to describe behavior, not people. So what I heard you say about your about your dad, and I think a lot of us can relate, oh, he was an angry person. He was an angry drunk. He was an angry whatever. And so I think of him as a bad man.

And for our own understanding of the emotion and the process and moving forward, like, well, what if he's not a bad man? But what if his behaviors were bad?

Right. What about his behaviors didn't align with my values that

I disagree with. Right. And this then makes it more empowering because, oh, I saw exemplified behaviors I do not want to exhibit, engage in, offer to others, perpetuate exactly. And so but rather than, well, you're you're bad, I'm choosing, and then what am I choosing? Well, I know I don't want that.

So what's what what is the choice I will make? Oh, I wanna be more patient. I wanna be more compassionate, more understanding. I wanna be more you know, whatever the thing is. And, again, I keep coming back.

So, like, why are we doing men's work and embodiment practice and shamanic work and yogic work? To do that, to to create and cultivate the experience and the capacity within ourselves to be the person we wanna be. Because it doesn't happen. It doesn't just happen. You don't decide, I'm I wasn't compassionate, but tomorrow I'm going to be, and then from then on.

No. You have to practice compassion and practice empathy. And part of that practice is becoming curious about it and listening to other people's experience of it and letting that inform you. And I think this is in large part why our elders are so important. Because a lot of this is, oh, through years and years and decades of experience, you have come to understand these things, and you might be able to offer me a bit of a shortcut.

Now if you think about the life, let's assume assume that we all live eighty years. And if an elder could give you a piece of advice that would get you to an understanding even five years sooner, that's kind of amazing. And then you could pass

it off to somebody else who could get it five years earlier than that.

Yeah. So if I if I get an insight when I'm I'm 46 right now. If I get an insight today that, you know, from an elder that I trust that I would otherwise have to wait another ten years, and I can start living it now. And then I can opt in you know? So this is the benefit of having a community where we can share our experiences and then have them held and seen.

So that the I think the important thing here is when you're the the new one with the least amount of experience in this kind of work, your experience is heard and seen and held also. It isn't it isn't compared to that elder who's been doing this practice for fifty years and, you know, is this calm elderly presence that we've seen. No. You get to say your thing too and then listen to all this other stuff.

And be able to bring in that beginner's experience as well. I think it's really beautiful to understand that we can all learn something from each other. We can all learn something from each other's experiences to hopefully navigate this world with a little bit more ease, a little bit more joy, and not control. Because I don't want to say controlling emotions. I don't believe emotions should be controlled.

It's more like respected. I don't think

emotions being controlled. I think emotions can be understood. I think they can be collaborated with. Yeah. And I think they can be directed via consciousness in in a variety respectful way.

Yeah. So I think I think I like that idea of the word control not exactly right. Because if we if we think about controlling them, at any moment when we have a big emotion, we may feel like we're failing to control them. So, yeah, I'm in agreement with you. Emotions come and go.

Mhmm. Oftentimes, we don't have control over whether or not they show up. We have control over how we respond to their to their showing up. In the same way that we get to respond to the weather. Oh, it's raining, and I can wear a raincoat or take an umbrella or, you know, drive instead of bike or, you know, whatever the thing is.

But I can't I can't stop the rain until it stops. So when we have anger, I'll it's I'm experiencing anger. So now what do I like, what is my anger raincoat or my anger umbrella? Mhmm. Because I'm not gonna I can't just poof, anger is gone.

Right. But I can take some steps.

I can't say every day is gonna be a sunny day, but I can definitely say I can be prepared for when it is a rainy day.

So sunny is happy and anger is rain. Like, what without let's go back to it. Like, what is sadness? Is it snow?

Well, sadness ice. Yeah. So Okay. I'm just I did I did have an opportunity to pull up Robert Frost's poem.

Oh, yay.

So with that, just a quick little recap. We covered anger today, and anger is really powerful. Anger is really powerful and oftentimes misunderstood. And I think that with today's conversation, we started to highlight that we can build a relationship with our anger. We can acknowledge that underneath that anger is something else.

And listening to what that something else might be and bringing curiosity to it can help us to make change in our own lives and in the world.

You you and I have both been in circles. I have seen it happen so many times. Men will get into a chi generator, and we are asked to hold this pose sometimes for fifteen minutes, twenty minutes. I've heard 30 and Yeah. I have seen anger, not just anger, but like lot fuel someone to keep going.

It can be so powerful. But in that practice, we start to understand our nuanced experience of it and bringing that nuanced experience. So anger can

be

powerful. Anger can be consciously directed. Anger needs to be respected. Anger, I believe, needs to be discussed, especially when it's at its beginning stages so that, oh, I'm starting to feel angry. And can we have an exploration before I am, like, out of control?

And I think if we can start this practice, there's a lot of power to be had. And, you know, this is a podcast for queer men and queer people. I think a lot of queer people have a lot of reason to be angry. Angry about what was expected of them and, you know, being forced to deny parts of their truth. And so and I think we we had that experience in a world where many of us were still not allowed to express it.

So why why do we need men's workspaces and queer men's workspaces for that purpose? And we saw it modeled yesterday and the day before in the circle. The men there needed it because it was a shared experience.

And and thank you for bringing the container for us to have that shared experience to be able to say, we're here to learn how to use anger as a tool of transformation rather than allowing it to be a destructive force because it really can be.

And I would the reason I brought it thank you for saying that. The reason I brought it was because I have been, you know, in the last few weeks experiencing some anger of my own. I wanna remind people as you're working with anger, that does not mean that it isn't uncomfortable. Mhmm. I have been uncomfortable in the last few weeks and and months, and and I am grateful that I have tools and community to engage consciously with this emotion and the discomfort that comes with it.

So I'd like to just say quickly thank you to everyone who supported me through that process. And it is my hope now to be that support for other people, and then hopefully we create a con a network of people. We can all support each other.

Right. You know, a bunch of steady oaks supporting each other, you know, keeping keeping each other's branches. Be like, hey. I got you today, or you might have to get me.

Is that is that rubbing the bark?

Yeah. No. No. No. That's my little branch.

My little branch going on saying, like, I got you. Oh, like I got you.

Like little neurons? Okay. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's wrap this up with this poem.

All right.

Well Wait. I got to laugh because I like your little branch.

Yeah. Okay. All right. This is Fire and Ice by Robert Frost. Some say the world will end in fire.

Some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire, I hold with those who favor fire. But if I had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate to know that for destruction, ice is also great and would suffice. With that, I'm feeling very complete. How are you?

I also feel complete. Will you take a sip, please? I will. Closing our eyes and connecting to our breath. It is with deep appreciation and gratitude for the shared space, for these insights and awarenesses that may have come that we release the sacred container, wishing you all safety, community, brotherhood, and love.

And with these words, container is open but not broken. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.