Anger and Shame

[Ami]

I have always(for a long time) been terrified of people's anger toward me. What would happen? I don't know ,but I would dance like crazy to avoid anger directed at me.
 Maybe anger's "sister" is shame. I would feel shame(I am bad) if s/one was angry at me.If there was one feeling that I wanted to avoid, even more than anger,it was shame.
  Shame is one of the worst feelings . I have been running from it for a long time. I think of all the ways that I tried to out-run it. They all were temporary. It was always lurking there, threatening to come to the surface. Now, I see that *I* have my finger on the shame button---no one else. It feels like others do,but they don't.
  It is the same with anger. Other's can't hurt me with their anger----ONLY if I let it. It rests with me and it always has. So much pain that I didn't need to suffer. No one can really hurt me unless I allow it.

[Gabben]

Ami -- just going back through the board and I came across this post of yours from Jan 4th. Since I am in a struggle with anger and shame myself I thought I would bring this back up again. You write very well about anger and shame. The reason that I feel ashamed when someone gets mad at me is because I have done something wrong and it has hurt them. The moment I can accept that I am human, therefore fallible and prone to error, the less shame I feel and the more I am able to think about the person who is angry and see what I can do to amend my harm.

Now, if I am the person who was harmed and I express my anger, truthfully and without intention to shame but simply to get it out so that I am not carrying the resentment, then others get defensive and scapegoat having to look at themselves by pointing the finger back at me and calling or labeling me abusive. But it is not really a personal pattern, it is a way of life for many...when we stand up for ourselves others are not going to like it and they are going to react. But is the risk I am willing to take, even if the person with whom I honestly try to express myself with reacts and refuses to hear it, then I think to myself, God save me from being angry, this is a sick person, how can I be helpful? Still working on this...

But I heard last night at church that if I want to correct the vice I should practice the corresponding virtue.  (I'll start this next week )

Here is the definition of shame:

1 a: a painful emotion caused by consciousness of guilt, shortcoming, or impropriety b: the susceptibility to such emotion <have you no shame?>
2: a condition of humiliating disgrace or disrepute : ignominy <the shame of being arrested>
3 a: something that brings censure or reproach; also : something to be regretted : pity <it's a shame you can't go> b: a cause of feeling shame.

((((((Ami)))))) Lise