On Dreamshaping: An Inside Job

Mark McNease

It’s not the thing the emotion attaches to, it’s the emotion.
It’s not the person or event the anger attaches to, it’s the anger.
It’s not the thoughts around which the confusion swirls, it’s the confusion itself.

When I’m consumed by an emotion, even something as simple as anger aimed at another driver on the road, it’s the emotion that generates my state of mind, not the other driver. So many people have a need be angry, or even enraged, without ever comprehending that the object of their rage is not the issue: it is the rage, and the need for it, that lies at the heart of the experience.

Think of it like misdirected aggression, something animals experience. An indoor cat that sees a feral cat outside will sometimes react with intense aggression, and sometimes, unable to direct that aggression toward the animal it sees through the window, it will focus that intense reaction onto another indoor cat. This happens even with cats that have lived together peacefully, many times playfully, for years. It is not the cat’s fault. The aggression must go somewhere, and the cat cannot distinguish between the animal outside and the animal it has been friends with in the same home.

We, too, often misdirect our aggressions. Unfortunately, we have many people who profit from telling us where to direct this aggression. Our shortcomings, our frustrations, our lack, they tell us, are all the fault of someone else, the other, and then, like cats who cannot help themselves, we pounce. My pain is your fault. My inability to stop being angry, or envious, or frustrated, is your fault, and so I must attack.

Understanding this is the first insight. The next is what to do about it. Begin by observing the emotion as something inside yourself, not something being forced upon you by outside sources. Those sources may change, or they may vanish, but only we can grant ourselves relief from the emotions ruling us as if we have no choice but to surrender to them. We can accept that they are fleeting, and speed them on their way.