Returning from Vacation & Coming Back to Anger

By Rob Handelman, Ph.D.

So I've been away on Cape Cod for the past two weeks. People don't get angry there.

This morning, my local morning train was not in service, so I had to find a bus, along with the throngs. Throngs make people tense. At a certain point the bus driver stopped for someone who was waiting at a bus stop, basically to tell him that he couldn't allow him on, because the bus was so crowded. The man was not happy and got on the bus anyway. The driver didn't like this. They got angry at each other, fairly loudly.

Oh, I'm back in the city. I immediately felt my body respond, my head started spinning because I had been free of this sort of conflict for weeks, and resented that I had to feel this, when I wasn't even involved. So I resented, and listened to myself and my body, trying to find opportunity through annoyance. Lo and behold, I found fear, because of course I found fear, I always find fear. And I didn’t like this fear. And I listened more and I found sadness, and of course my own anger, and confusion, because being mindful didn't make everything all better. And it's not supposed to, it's just supposed to help us be more mindful.