Pema Chödrön, Don’t Bite the Hook Part 1 of 6 : Anger
November 5, 2009 by dr. lam
Pema Chödrön, formerly Deirdre Blomfield-Brown, is a Tibetan Buddhist nun, who was alluded to in the book Broken Open by Elizabeth Lesser, which we covered a few months ago. I was fascinated enough with the introduction to her thoughts that I wrote a cursory blog on it and now found myself exploring more of her teachings and thoughts. Her seminar/audiobook, Don’t Bite the Hook, references what happens when a fish gets tempted to be ensnared by the bait and gets carried away to an undesirable place. The subtitle for this seminar is Finding Freedom from Anger, Resentment, and Other Destructive Emotions perhaps describes the intent more directly than the metaphoric main title.
The Tibetan Buddhist concept of a “hook” is known as shempa, which describes a thought or an idea that gets buried further and further into our heart, mind, and soul so that we cannot let go of it. The shempa gets hooked into us and we get carried away like an unsuspecting fish by a hook. This seminar focuses on how to recognize and let go of our shempas.
She opens the book with how the power of anger can be such an emotion that shatters all that is good up until the point that it occurs. We may be happily going our way until something provokes us, then we “cycle down” from anger shattering everything that came before. Is anger ever justified? Well perhaps. However, most oftentimes it only leads to regret that we engaged in it and it blankets all good emotions from that point forward. When we engage in anger we cause mutual destruction and lower all energies downward.
We must also begin to believe that anger is almost never or never justified. When we start to see it all around us as a righteous response to a situation, we will then enlist it in such a way that it will become more ingrained in us as a character response. When we start to see the emotion as an alien one we will begin to disengage from it as an unhealthy response so that when times come that we would say that it would be justified, we actually find that was a rationalization so that we could behave in that fashion. Like everything in life, it takes practice, over days, months, and years. Tomorrow we will talk about ways to release anger among other negative forces that can pervade our life.
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8 Responses to “Pema Chödrön, Don’t Bite the Hook Part 1 of 6 : Anger”
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Fascinating conceptualization here. I believe anger is appropriate moral response at times. However, the world is full of “shempa” and good to know the difference.
Thank you for your excellent blog, as always.
thanks nord!
I agree with this concept, and am looking forward to reading tomorrow!
thanks dawn!
Great, Dr. Lam!
Here’s my theory: I think that anger and depression are in a sense the same thing only different sides of the coin. I think just focusing on holding back anger and not dealing with it properly can turn into depression. Just my theory. I think that feeling a little bit of those emotions is healthy to a degree as feeling all emotions are for a reason to signal that something is not right, etc, but expressing them in an extreme manner or expressing them over trivial irritations is the point where it is out of control. Logically, there is no reason to get upset beyond an appropriate level. Instead of just focusing on holding back anger when something irritates someone (although it should be held back), I think someone should consider what is making him/her angry and consider that anger doesn’t get anywhere, in fact it makes almost any situation worse, and if it is in his/her means to change the situation, that there are better ways to achieve that result looking at the whole picture. I think that if someone considers this when s/he is angry, that person will realize that either what s/he is upset about is trivial and not worth getting upset over, or that there is a better way to change the situation, or that it is not in his/her means to control and must be dropped. I really like your point about starting with the little things that upset us because uncontrolled anger starts with those and magnifies. Some things are not in our control and there are injustices that occur, things don’t go our way, there is irresponsibility, etc, all of which, even if it be our own personal well-being, expressing out-of-control anger, resentment and depression doesn’t achieve anything beneficial but is detrimental, and I think someone should consider that when angry more than just focusing on holding that anger back. I look at anger and other destructive emotions as a warning signal that something is wrong and not as a tool. Just my thoughts.
Thanks for the great blogs, Dr. Lam!!! Us blog buddies can’t thank you enough for all the work and thought you put into them!!!
thanks heather. great insight!
Thanks, Dr. Lam. I learned that in anger management class.
JUST KIDDING!!! LOL
lol.