If you are a living, breathing, human being right now you have seen how much rage there is out in the world right now.  If you’ve heard the chants “I can’t breathe” and feel the gravity of them, you have a sense of the gist of our current societal struggle, both against a virus and against the injustices we are all grappling with right now.  If you are a fan of the series ‘Little Fires Everywhere,’ you will also appreciate the rest of this piece.

Injustices are the Trigger that Gets Rage Going

Both in the TV series and in real life, you perceive how you or others are being treated unfairly.  You may react with shock, horror, grief, or rage.  These offenses can be outright terrible, or barely noticeable slights.  The glaring ones are those we are seeing in the news and streets of our towns and cities, the less noticeable ones are more abundant in Little Fires Everywhere.  Regardless of the offenses, you may have noticed yourself boiling up with very unpleasant feelings and emotions.  These are amplified in times like our current pandemic of Covid-19.

What Magnifies the Rage

People in authority have a responsibility to act in ways that don't violate the public trust, and when you see them doing otherwise, this can serve to activate what is called survival rage.  This is a result of witnessing injustices and aggression towards individuals, society, and the world at large.  If you put up with too much of that, a boiling point is reached when the urge to strike out can be too great.  If this goes into more violence then it only keeps the cycle going.  Unfortunately, that is what grabs the headlines and dominates the news as well.  Both now and in Little Fires Everywhere, we see the results of aggression and injustices in the lives of everyone involved.  There’s also an element of how what goes around comes around for the main characters, Mia and Elena.  You can see this in how both Mia’s and Elena’s daughters are so upset and angry at her, as well as how the whole family suffers.

How to Transform the Rage

Going from rage to peaceful, nonviolent protest and action is no easy task.  It happens for different people in different ways, and I’ll be honest that at this point I haven’t finished watching the show to find out what happens in the last episode.  What I can tell you is that in real life people are able to find a place of love for themselves, the community, each other so that impulse to strike out against another is transformed into peaceful action that allows you to join together with others to work towards a common goal of joint action.  This is something Elena and Mia never get to in the story, but it is being done in our public squares and cities when groups of people from all walks of life demonstrate against the injustices they see and demand change.  

What I Can Do to Help

If you suffer from survival rage, or any of the other emotions that can result from what is going on these days, I can help you to cope and deal with them so they don’t rule or ruin your life.  I have a number of different approaches I have learned in my 10+ years as a therapist that can help you to overcome these.  One of them is Image Transformation Therapy (ImTT), which is a simple breathing and visualization technique that can help you be better able to cope with the intense and overwhelming emotions that go with living in the times we are going through.  I invite you to call me at the number above, or fill out the form below and I will get back to you.  I offer a free 20-minute phone consultation to help you get a better idea of whether I might be able to help you or not.  It could be the difference between sanity and insanity, but you’ve got so much to gain by getting a better handle on your emotions.  Our world needs it now more than ever!  

Visit our page on trauma therapy to learn more about how Scott can help you with trauma. 

About the author:  Scott Kampschaefer, LCSW is a private practice therapist in Frederick, Maryland.  He has an extensive background in working with depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder at a clinic for older adults with these disorders in Austin.  He now works with adults and adolescents 14 and up in private practice. His e-book is entitled Life’s Lessons from the Young and the Old and is available for purchase on Amazon.