• happy and talking about life
• eating (maybe chewing just a tad ‘too’ loud)
• accidentally spill something
• leave clothes on the floor
• don’t make the bed
• speak too loudly

When we’re on the receiving end of this, it’s common for us to feel emotionally abandoned, criticized, afraid, and resentful towards our partner. It’s also common to question the relationship during these times. On the other hand, when we feel this way about someone else (meaning all of a sudden we feel very angry or judgmental towards our partner) it’s common to feel so overwhelmed by the negative emotions that we feel like we can’t stop ourselves from reacting negatively and can’t see beyond our negative emotions (even though we might want to).

A key thing to understand about this is that these situations are not ‘bad’, and they don’t mean that the relationship is not a good fit or that there is no love. As soon as we label something as bad, we start to blame, judge, and reject everything around us – including our partner and ourselves – and then feel sad, fearful, angry, or worried. Of course, feeling sad, fearful, angry, or worried doesn’t help us optimally navigate the situation by making wise, calm, collected, intentional choices. It doesn’t help us maintain an internal state of intentionality, self-love, and inner-peace that will allow us to navigate that situation consciously. It’s useful to learn to make peace with these difficult, seemingly threatening situations so that they no longer trigger us. That way, no matter what the emotional processes of those around us, we can remain peaceful, joyful, accepting, and loving and continue navigating towards our goals.

What’s actually happening when our partner get’s intensely angry over little things is that they are reliving past pain and trauma and actually ‘venting’ it, expressing it, and reprocessing it using the relationship. That’s a “GOOD” thing because by venting it, they can discover it, learn from it and release it! Relationships are actually vehicles for exactly this kind of processing. Whatever partner we choose, this type of situation is going to come up! Making peace with this and learning to wisely navigate these situations is important because this happens in every relationship – with parents, spouses, children, friends, family members, colleagues and strangers. We need not take this anger that seems to come about for nothing or no reason personally or as permanent – it is temporary and shall pass – especially if we don’t react. In fact, when we don’t react in situations like this our partner will often realize that they got triggered and learn a lot from it. This means that if we stay calm and loving during these situations, we can actually act as mirror and help our partner transcend that prior pain and trauma they’re re-experiencing. Please watch the video for more information on this common relationship dynamic.

If you can relate to getting angry over small things and you’d like to understand how to clear that, you can use meditation to introspect on what triggered you. Once you find the trigger (maybe it was the sound of them chewing, for example), you can then identify why that brought up so much emotion for you. For example, if it was the sound of them chewing, you can introspect on why that triggers you. Did you get punished for this in your childhood? Was this something you saw someone else get punished for once? Why does it bother you? Are you making any “if this, then that” projections about it? For example – “if they chew loudly then…” or “if I chew loudly then…”. In meditation, you can fill in these blanks to understand what your subconscious mind is projecting (which is, in turn, what your emotional system is reacting to so strongly). This is a process of analytical meditation and can help you transcend negative emotions. For help with this process consider a spiritual counseling session. Our 1-1 facilitation can help you make a lot of progress and open new doors.