Lately I've been reading this site among others, watching videos, and talking to a few ex mormon friends a bit more than usual and I have become angry. Extreme anger that I'm losing sleep over. Vile abhorrent rage. I've gotten in so many arguments with my family and old friends lately. My old young mens teacher (who told us EVERY sunday "the most important thing you can do in your life is go on a mission") came by on Sunday (I haven't gone to my home ward in well over a year) and asked me to go to lunch with him. I said no because I know why he's asking me. He asks me again and I say no. This repeated a few more times. I just clenched my jaw and withheld so much anger. I've also been going over a lot of hypothetical conversations which make me equally angry. I don't know what to do, obviously I could just stop thinking about this but that won't solve anything, just brush it off and wait for it to come back.

My question is what can I do to make myself less angry? I don't want to stop learning about the church because I feel like I should why I don't believe in it anymore. What do you guys do to avoid becoming angry?

That was what helped me.

When I remember how much pain that TSCC caused me as a youth, then I think of others going trough it for NO REASON....I get angry.

You have every right to be angry.

Feel it, acknowledge it, savor it and then give it some time.

Acknowledge that it's one of the steps and give yourself time to adjust to this new knowledge. Writing about it may prove cathartic, vlog your hypothetical conversations I say and post it so we can all appreciate it. Just my 2 cents.

You have to work through the anger. Figure out why you are angry. The answer is not always as obvious as it seems. For me, I was angry that I let myself be fooled for so long. I could be angry at everyone else all day long, but until I realized that I was the one I was really angry at, there wasn't much going to change.

Don't suppress the anger, but work through it philosophically and systematically replace it with more useful thoughts. Letting go of anger is totally different than pushing it down and pretending it's not there. Let yourself feel it, but don't obsess over it. Talk it out with other people.

Try to get some perspective. If I feel frustrated over the time I wasted believing nonsense, I just focus on the fact that I go out when I did and have the rest of my life without it. If I feel helpless that I cannot share my insights with my still-believing relatives, I take comfort in the fact that they are still alive and healthy and free to make their own choices.

Exercise can help a lot, too. And sometimes beer.

In response to Levi, I've been where I am as far as my believes go for almost 2 years. Granted, I still learn more every day and solidify my lack of beliefs.

to Pista: I'm angry because I personally feel like it robbed me of a lot of my youth. I was depressed and anti social and I feel like a fair amount of that came directly from the church, and some more because of how it affected my family and then how they passed it on to me. This does seem like a scapegoat and a way for me to alienate the mormon church so I'm sure there's more to it.

I feel like all I do is work through things philosophically. I find more transcendence in existential books than I ever did in the church, but still it's not enough.

I do exercise, it does help me a lot. and sometimes beer.

I feel like I put a lot of work of into this, and it ultimately me more upset because I am still bitter about being raised in the church.

A lot of us feel like our youth (and for many, well beyond youth) was robbed. This is not a unique experience for anyone. It is pretty normal to look back with a regret over either circumstances we could not change or choices we wish we had not made. Regret can be a difficult thing to deal with, because it makes us feel powerless, and that can make us feel angry.

I don't know if this helps at all, but chances are if it weren't the church, it would have been something else. I don't know a single person who doesn't look back at his youth and wish something had been different. I know a really smart guy whose whole life went off track because his mom married an abusive stepfather. Something like 80% of the population has major regrets about their educational decisions. Unfortunately, discovering that our lives are not what we would choose is just more normal than not.

Besides growing up in a cult, I always hated that I was from a podunk town in Idaho. It made me feel terribly boring and isolated. As I have gotten older and made my way through the world, I have figured out how to make my background something quirky and interesting. People outside of Utaho think Mormonism is a fascinating topic for discussion. I make it funny -- which is easy.

And Levi is so right about time. This is just one of those things that you can't flip like a switch. One day you will wake up and realize that you're not angry anymore; that it just doesn't matter any more and your life is full of everything else and this is just a part of your past that has made you who you are today. I wish that day was today, but it really does take time.

What are you working on going forward? Now that you have taken control of you life, what are you going to do with it?

I agree, if it wasn't the church it would probably be something else.

About to go back to school. I went to BYUI, immediately realized the church was a fraud. Stuck in there and got my associates. Only problem is my associates degree doesn't transfer well at all, so I'm going to the U of U. I'm kind of bummed about this because my "new direction" is me going to Salt Lake City. I'm pretty optimistic about this but its a bummer that I'll be going back to a heavily mormon place. Aside from that I look on the bright side knowing that I came to my conclusions at a young age and I still have tons ahead.

Still, a lot of things just make me angry. My best friends from my childhood are on missions. My family hasn't "disowned" me, but I am clearly the black sheep and I feel like this will always hang over me.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/12/2012 04:38AM by babyraptorjesus.

I don't know enough about you to give you specific advice, but I am just going to throw a few things out there; things I'm sure you've considered:

Even if it is a little more work, is there a school where you would much rather go? College can be one of the best, most pivotal experiences of your life, and I wish I had not compromised on some of my choices.

Would taking some time off of school to travel or work be a good choice? Sometimes distance and perspective is invaluable.

Yes, your background and your family will always be a part of who you are, but it will not necessarily always hang over you. You will make new friends, you will find new interests, and you will eventually fill your life with things of your choosing that will displace the anger.

Oh, and by the way, other things, that you also have no control over -- that have nothing to do with religion -- will also come along and fuck up your plans. For the rest of your life. I wish I knew how to stop that, but it just seems to come with the deal.

Are you happy where you are now in your life?

It has taken all that you have gone through to bring you to the place where you are now.

If that place is not what you want it to be, then your rage is that discontent still eating at you...urging you on.

Use that rage to reconize that you still need to make changes...changes that will quiet the rage and eventually silence it altogether.

I feel like I was just there. I was soooooooo ANGRY!!! It consumed me. I've looked back and tried to isolated things I did that made me less angry after reading your post.

1-Time. Lots and lots of time...
2-I Studied and Read a ton.
3-I focused on things that brought me peace and made me happy.
4-I made new friends that I could be honest with.

Hang in there.

...but I periodically go to a shooting range and fire at paper targets. Helps work out a lot of my aggression. But then, there's the whole debate about gun control and all that which I don't really want to get into.

Just a suggestion.

But I've written some of my best stuff while processing some of my anger. It's amazing how well received angst can be. :)

She used to love to draw caricatures of loathsome people for targets, and she and dad would blast away.

The range is gone so there's no place to go now to do that... so she writes.

and writes... and writes.

Great advice from everyone here. THe thing that helped me the most, was recognizing that I would be feeling anger many times, it won't necessarily go away when you want it to.

However, I gave a lot of thought as to how I would express it, in what form I would release it when it surfaced. It can be used for good or evil. HaHa.

Beyond that, what everybody says. Introspection and knowledge.

I needed validation. It helped me to read this board and also talk in person to other people that "get it" and acknowledge what BS we lived through. The U would have free counseling--i would find a non-mo and talk to them if it were me. Some people are really opposed to talking to counselors but it isn't so bad once you try it. I joined a recovering from religion meetup group that really helped as well. None of them are ex-mos but we share astonishing similarities.

I suspect your family is what keeps picking at the scab. They aren't giving you validation and are sure you are on the wrong track. That would make anyone angry.

Someone told me his therapiest suggested he writes letters to the past/present people in his life who he needed to apologize or tell off, let it all out and then burn the letters. I think it is the act of letting itout that helps in letting go.

It's been about two years since I began to read the true history and doctrine of the church. At first I was shocked and I honestly couldn't think of the church as damaging and I couldn't understand why people were angry. I thought I was OK, but then the more I learned and the more my dormant brain woke up, I began to be angry and resented the church. I didn't like that feeling but it happened. I've narrowed down my main issues and have talked or posted about them. I'd say that sorting out the issues and letting it out, sharing that anger with others will help you, you've mentioned you also do it through exercise and that is great. Time will help you with the rest. It also helps reading this board and knowing that your thoughts and feelings are valid. I think that's what this board has done for me a lot of times, validate my feelings. You have a right to be angry, we all have a right to be angry and express it so that we can eventually heal.

Dealing with TBMs is frustrating because no matter what they will never get you, you will always be wrong in their eyes and that just fuels the anger. I look at them with a smile on my face thinking you are the one brainwashed, it doesn't get to me much anymore.

My main issues I've learned are:
Tithing
Lies
Robbing people of their own unique personalities/ideas/dreams

Good luck babyraptorjesus. Love the name, btw.

D

And pushups..

I suggest you continue your amazing talent with words.

I suggest you create, or co create a book another book, prepare the script for a movie, write a screne play or an advertizement, or go into writing more parody and comedy.

I suggest your keen insight into the absurd obscure ironies of life make you a voice to an audience that you can make howl with laughter.

I would point out to you that only by going through can you talk to- rather than talk to about what they are going through. You speak with an inner frame, an intellectual twang resonating with where you have been.

This writing is what you are delivering. diverting. your audience with. Its the stuff of the story of life's scripts. That's who you are when you let this flow- this diverting flow- this tremendous energy-
it can make great art. this energy you now perceive.

but how to harness it get it back to something which can assist ?

I needed space my self- kind of circling back in toward the family I grew up with later, and flying away in a big circle that headed back home once in a while; getting a job in community service back with the old YCC (youth conservation corps) helped me tremdously. Leaving home for a while, working physically on something I believed in, contributing to something somewhere- gave me validity I believed (somewhat accurately) I could not get from my family (parents/siblings.)

And processing that anger- it came back out again and again- included walks around a track when my leg dragged and I was too weak to run after a surgery LOL arguing quibling quarreling about everything with my best friends (who was with me, is still with me) we argued about everything from God to money to chemistry, we quibbled about philosophy ordering reality clashed hugged hashed out our rage together.

every time there is a new injustice in life, this anger, it resurfaces again. Learning to redirect or use the flow- learning how to do so- you'd better begin. Because life is filled with injustices & it will not end.

phiscally redirecting it- lifting weight- pushing a bar above your chest (a Smith machine so you can push to your limit but it will not fall- push until your arms shake- it redirects the rage.)
its an endocrine thing. it can elevate the fight flight stress hormone you or me perceive as anxiety- and push until the muscle group (not the whole body muscles you want to walk don't push them all this hard) push in isolated group until its trembling. and there is a change in your breathing. Breath hard breath out when you push the weight. It changes your inner mental state. by controling or pushing the weight- it manages your state. You can do this.
a great athlete (which I am not) can use their own body weight, hang by their toes or pull ups, hold their arms int a door frame brace and make a table with their legs like a gymnist- and not buy a thing no gymn membership no equipment. 'runners' high'.

which reminds me I'd better move the laundry and push a few reps of weight up over my head, it'd be better to have control over the weight bar and my breathing than revisit memories wished ful wistful resist my thoughts following a memory track bringing all of the pain back.
using the bar pushing it over my head I want to move onward find power live my purpose- instead.

NLP certainly helped me a great deal, and that was only a cassette tape!

Time and distance.

By distance I mean emotional and intellectual distance, not necessarily physical/geographical.

Focus your life on the things YOU DECIDE are important and go after them 100%. Fill your mind and waking hours with positive pursuits. Surprisingly, over time, the junk from the past will fade in the rearview mirror and your anger will too since you're too busy living today's life experiences overflowing with non-mormon things.

Be careful not to waste too much time/emotional energy being angry at the past. Learn from it, but don't obsess over it and spend every day angry at the past. Move forward.

you may be able to meet up with all the exmos who live there--like gaylayale. And don't they hold meetings there? The only people who really understand are those who have been there.

I have been in therapy off and on for 13 or 14 years with an exmo therapist (didn't know he was exmo at the time). He has helped me work through A LOT of anger over what a mess my life became because of decisions I made because I was raised mormon. Even those of us who lost more of our lives to mormonism than you did have found peace. The worst anger I dealt with though was when my husband left me--and, actually, one day I realized it was changing me and I chose to quit arguing with him and it made a world of difference.

The most important thing you can do though is allow yourself to be angry--and acknowledge that it is okay to be angry. Mormonism taught us we weren't allowed and I think that makes it that much more difficult for us to deal with it.

And, if it were me, I'd refuse to allow those people to engage me who are just trying to talk you out of your feelings.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/12/2012 03:25PM by cl2.

Come out of the closet. That might help.

There is so much social, and family pressure to be MORMON that it's difficult to disengage from the Church. The Church's tentacles are everywhere.

Don't tell the old YM's teacher "no." Say, "I'm sure you want me to go to lunch so you can start prying about my feelings about the Church and try to reactivate me. I have absolutely no interest in going through that." Then when he says, "no, that's not it at all," pause, look at him, and say, "why do I find that hard to believe?"

When we say "not now" or "I'm too busy this week" we not only put off the problem, but we compound it by acting in a way that is interpreted as feeling other than how we actually feel. We've given them the impression that we'd like to except for other reasons when actually we would NOT like to.

Mormons say stuff like, "he's going through some problems now with his testimony," when they should be saying, "He doesn't believe it at all." Let's let them say the right thing.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/12/2012 03:28PM by baura.

Thanks for the advice friends. I know what I need to do, I need to move forward and make some positive changes. Unfortunately that is easier said than done. Hopefully I'll make some progress soon.

Write a list of all the major negative aspects of your life that are directly attributable to the church.

Write another list of all your best qualities and talents, no matter what source they came from.

Burn the first list. Literally.

Put the second list on your bathroom mirror and read it every day.

babyraptorjesus, I just got out of BYUI too! Congrats on getting out early. Maybe we knew each other - I'm just coming out from under cover, need a few more months before I'm totally free! Glad to hear I wasn't alone there, too bad there was no way to find the nonbelievers there - too risky since they are holding your degree hostage. Good luck with everything. Trying to get out when you are young is hard, all of your Mormon friends (and if you went to BYUI that's who the majority of your college friends were) still believe in Santa Clause and when you tell them the truth they usually run to their parents or ecclesiastical leaders who will happily solidify their faith. Sad deal. The intellectual freedom makes it all worth it for me, doesn't make it suck less though.

Maybe we did know each other, that'd be cool. My name's Kyle, I'm 20, 6', and uh, brown hair? Hah sounds like I'm describing myself on a dating site. Trust me, you were'nt alone. I had 4 or 5 good friends who shared the exact same beliefs as me, and more who were "fence sitters". It did feel like we were alone sometimes. We were always looking for likeminded people, but to no avail. It's just so hard to know unless you really get to know someone, you can't say "Hey my names Kyle and I am a closet exMo atheist, what's your name?" At least we planted seeds of "doubt" (truth) in a lot of people's minds in a matter of a few conversations.

Oh and to Greekgod- I went from spring 2010-fall/spring 2011. Looks like we missed each other.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/13/2012 03:25AM by babyraptorjesus.

babyraptorjesus (Kyle) , that is good to hear! I was hoping someone else was having those conversations with everybody else as well. Can't tell you how many nights I stayed up till three in the morning teaching the true church history to roommates and friends. One of my best friends just started doing some reading after a couple of years of conversations and found athiesm in just a couple of weeks! Hope the seeds of doubt we planted take root :) Now if only I could convince my girlfriend to leave the Morg too. That's just wishful thinking though.
My name is Joe (yep after Smith) Can't say much still cause I am a few months from my degree. Keep on the board, your name is hard to miss, We will talk soon!

Joe, I've still got some friends there would love to know more like minded people. If you'd like we should get in touch somehow.

Kyle that would be cool, Im on an internship right now but I will be back in April for a few weeks. Will they still be there? I would like to meet them

The hatred of all the bullshit and hurt associated with the TSSC is o.k.

Rage, get rid of it. Prison sucks (I know).

The best way to get rid of rage against TSCC is to write your letter of resignation, sent it right away and QUIT the crappy church!
It is absolutely refreshing and rejuvenating! Try it!