‘Anger and Shame feed each other.’
Another aspect of anger is that it is the fuel to shame.
Have you ever sat in your car outside your own home, telling yourself, "be calm, don't lose it tonight," quietly wanting a different outcome to yesterday, and to the day before that?
You walk through the door, and in no time at all, the anger comes out. Later on you sit there confused, asking yourself, "Why did I react like that? That is not who I want to be."
In my book I call it 'The Werewolf Within.'
It was never really about what happened at the door. Underneath the aspect of anger was shame, and a pile of other emotions. The shame was the fuel, and the werewolf delivered the anger.
Anger is just one facet of a diamond, that all of us are multifaceted. Turn it to the light and something softer is almost always hiding behind it.
As the saying goes, "You cannot see your reflection in boiling water." When the water calms, what might your anger be protecting you.?
‘Um. The Atomic symbol for confusion.’
Um. The atomic symbol for confusion.
We have all been there. That foggy, stuck, “I don’t even know what I’m feeling or what to do next” place. And most of us treat confusion like a dead end, a sign something has gone wrong with us.
Here is a gentler way to see it. Confusion is not the end of the road. It is the step right before clarity.
Think about it. You only feel confused when your old way of seeing something no longer fits. The fog is not a wall, it is a sign you have outgrown the old map and a clearer one is forming. Confusion is clarity, still getting dressed.
The mistake we make is running from the fog, numbing it, scrolling past it, staying busy, anything to not sit in the not-knowing. And whatever we run from, waits for us. The way out of confusion was never around it. It is through it.
So when the fog rolls in, and this is not a judgement, we all get lost in it, try not to panic. Get still. Ask one honest question. Clarity is closer than it feels.
What are you confused about right now that might simply be clarity on its way?
'The limits of our language become the limits of our inner world.'
‘The limits of our language become the limits of our inner world.’
Someone asks how you are, and out comes “not too bad,” “fine,” “yeah, I’m good.” Someone asks what’s wrong, and the best you can manage is “I’m angry” or “I’m over it.” Not because that’s the whole truth of what you feel, only because those are the only words you were ever given for it.
We were taught spelling, maths, grammar, a thousand things about the world out there. Almost none of us were taught the language of what goes on inside us.
I know this one from the inside. I grew up in a Greek-speaking home and started school with barely any English. I was put in a special class, and I carried a quiet belief for years that I was somehow less. I wasn’t short of intelligence. I was short of words, in the one language that room counted.
Here is the thing. A whole rich inner world, disappointment, grief, longing, shame, gets crushed down into the few blunt words we have. Angry. Frustrated. Fine. It’s like trying to paint a sunset with three crayons.
And this is not a judgement. We all do the best we can with what we know today. The good news is you can grow the words at any age. The moment you can name what you feel, you can begin to understand it, share it, and heal it.
What are you really feeling, underneath the word you usually reach for?
‘How Can a Dream Come True If You Never Let Yourself Have One?’
'How can a dream come true if you never let yourself have one?'
How can a dream come true if you never let yourself have one?
So often it isn't the dream that's out of reach — it's that somewhere along the way we quietly decided we don't deserve one. So we settle for the familiar, even when the familiar is costing us dearly.
Give yourself permission first. The "how" can come later.
‘A crack in the render is cosmetic. A crack in the structure brings the whole thing down. What are you avoiding and rendering over?’
“A crack in the render is cosmetic. A crack in the structure brings the whole thing down.
“What are you avoiding and rendering over?”
The building metaphor here does a lot of work — it quietly signals your trade background while making the psychological point land. Here's a version tuned for each platform.
LinkedIn (professional, a touch more reflective — fewer tags)
A crack in the render is cosmetic.
A crack in the structure brings the whole thing down.
What are you avoiding and rendering over?
After 36 years in building, I learned to tell the difference between a surface flaw and a structural one. The same is true for people. We get good at rendering over the cracks — staying busy, staying pleasant, keeping up appearances — while the load-bearing wall quietly gives way underneath. The work isn't in the patch job. It's in being honest about what's actually holding you up.