My cheeks were red. I could feel the heat, and I didn’t dare open my mouth.  She had offended me, again.  All the love I generally have in my heart was gone, and I felt defensive and spiteful.  What happened?  I didn’t enjoy being around this person because I was always flaring up.  It was embarrassing, it was distracting, and it was always uncomfortable.  I had no idea how to prevent her from “pushing my buttons” nearly every time I was around her.   What could I do?

“You don’t love me,” my child accused me.  In spite of it being so ridiculous, so contrary to the truth and all tangible evidence, I was hurt. “Everything I do shows I love you.  Even though you can’t see it now, my saying “No” is an expression of love for you,” I thought, as I rationally tried to pull myself together.  I logically know that a lie is no reason to flare up, but I sometimes wonder, could someone please inform my body?  Some part of me worries it might be true, that they don’t know or feel my love.  It is crushing and distracting.  Cascades of emotion mute whatever I was doing into oblivion.  I just try to deal with the flash flood.   

Yanked Around

Clearly I needed a solution so that my mood was not at the mercy of chance or necessary encounters with others.  I was letting them control me, and that really bothered me.  I want to be free.  But how?  Somehow or other I was always getting yanked around.

I needed to take back control, but I wasn’t really sure how I lost it.  The whole problem seemed to defy logic.  Of course it is crazy to let other people send you on an emotional rollercoaster.   I wanted to get off.  But I felt like my internal life was as involuntary as the Texas weather, sunny and warm one moment and a sixty degree drop in temperature the next.

Observe

I know that accurately finding and defining the problem is at least half of the solution.  But, in this case, I had no idea what the cause of my problems even were.  What was triggering it?  Were there patterns to my responses?  Why did this particular woman always grate on me?  

I was looking for how to find the root cause of my flare ups.

I found the solution in an odd place.  My husband and I had been having our children write “pages” whenever they needed to be punished.  I loved this consequence because it didn’t punish me, was almost always relevant (I chose what the sentences said related to the crime), and could be performed completely without supervision.  I collected these pages for about a year.  At the end of the year, I sorted them out and tally marked the topics of challenge for each of my children.  Then, in a big family meeting, I gave them all back.  I asked them to see for themselves what they needed to work on.  The volume on certain subjects gave them visual, personal, and indisputable feedback.  I decided to try that for myself.

I got a fifteen cent spiral notebook and covered the front with a fiery cauldron picture I found in an art magazine.  It looked like how I felt– knocked over, dark and incendiary.  For nearly a year, I didn’t try to fix my flare ups.  I just tried to not erupt and instead took it to my notebook where I poured in the coals of everything that upset me.  I didn’t judge or question it.  I just dumped.  

Analyze

I made it to the last page of my spiral.  I felt strangely powerful holding the key to understanding my hot buttons in my hand.  It surprised me that even though I’d been writing it down for months, I still
didn’t know what was going on.   

I started by making a list of subjects or topics that would inflame me and then tally mark it when it came up again.  Some of mine were– lying, hearing other people’s private business shared in public by a third party, not feeling trusted, and disloyalty.  Suddenly, the mystery was gone.

Values

I love the truth.  I am incredibly loyal to my family and friends.  I am worthy of trust (although being human I do make mistakes and sometimes have to let people down).  Being trustworthy is so important to me, that I guard your private business and protect it more carefully than my own.  Is it any wonder that I’m upset when some of my primary values are tossed around as inconsequential or unimportant to others?  

It is logical.  I follow personal rules of behavior based on my strongest values.  It just makes sense that when someone acts contrary to those core, strong values that I may flare up.  It feels like a personal attack.  Understanding it began to loosen the knot of confusion.  

Working it out

Understanding that my “hot buttons” were related to core values helped me understand why it was happening.  I’m not about to let go of my primary values.  That is a large part of what makes me, me. So, what could I do?  It turned out to be easy.

I gave them permission.  I give you, friend, permission to not follow my rules.  You should be true to your values and your perspective.  I have no right to presume that you should know and follow mine. We are all accountable to God and ourselves in the mirror, that ought to be good enough for me.  

How it turned out

At first, when I was with this friend, I would have to talk myself through it.  She’d start in telling me someone else’s private info., often not directly to me (because I can’t stand it) but in my hearing (I think the publicness of it was the most offensive to me of all).  I would go into my head and say, “You don’t have to follow my rules.”  That would calm me down because I see I am not her mother, and I respect her.  To me this is simply the truth.  I don’t have to like it and probably never will.  That is okay.  I can leave, etc.  She will never be my closest friend because I can’t trust what she will say, but that is also okay.  Now, I am truly at peace with her and our friendship, while not super close, is finally at peace.  No one appreciates that more than I.

The “you don’t love me” flare up is gone.  I just say to myself, “that is a lie.”  Sometimes I will even say that out loud to my children.  I don’t argue it, I just label it.  I want to concern myself with the truth.  I value truth.  If my children feel like emotionally punching me when they don’t like my “no” (and after all, none of us like to be told “no”), I see it for what it is.  It is a temper tantrum for not getting their way.  It really isn’t about me.  

The truth really does set us free.

I hope this process that worked for me will be helpful to you as you unravel your own personal mysteries.  It was so powerful for me that I literally feel “cured.”  I haven’t had these flare ups in years. It is so, so nice to be able to focus on what is truly more important and not be immediately and almost violently sidetracked by other people’s inadvertent trespasses.  

Self Improvement- To read more of DarEll’s articles, click here.

May your values

become more

than a path

of infernal

war.

Namaste,

DarEll S. Hoskisson

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