[histhoughtslately]

[sandradisenchanted]

I have an anger management problem. My first instinct has always been rage. I was the girl who punched holes in the walls, screamed mean things at people, and had to leave gatherings shaking with fury.

Then I worked in foster care, and got a crash course in why that's not ok. Yes, sure, I also did extensive therapy, but my foster babies were the motivation I needed to change. I had to meet their rage with love and be oh so very consistent about it, because kids will take one inconsistent moment and turn it into a lifetime of trust issues. I had to love them hard enough to overwhelm my first angry instinct.

Now I have an abundance of empathy. Someone is uncomfortablly possessive? They must feel so insecure inside. The lady who apologizes so much it's irritating? I have to wonder who made her feel so inconvenient and unimportant that she needs to do that. My micromanaging boss the control freak? Wow, a lot of bad must have happened to her that she only feels safe when she's got such tight hands wrapped around things.

I realized today that my first instinct isn't rage anymore. I'm in my mid-thirties, and now my first instinct is to try to understand. Anger is there, it's still an option, I chant "being mad won't fix this" a lot more than the average person, but my initial reaction isn't the red haze anymore. It gets better. It takes literally decades of work and therapy and apologies and trying again, but my god, I think I did it. I think I rewired my brain to love.

[mollybeenoel]

[mollybeenoel]

[annstf]

"do you have insta?" i have an address where u can send flowers and love letters

[modedamour]

[angelicdewdrop]

[seabeck]

Looming

[snototter]

A Galapagos sea lion (Zalophus wollebaeki) in Galapagos, Ecuador

by divindk

[vintagewildlife]

Boreal owlets By: Patricia & Gregory Hayward From: Natural History Magazine 1989

[heateron]

hearts of darkness (1991) dir. eleanor coppola

[seabeck]

Frost and light

[angelicdewdrop]

[seabeck]

Pillar in the mist

[soup-mother]

Sober as fuck at the back of the club going onto Wikipedia and typing "List of birds"

[power-chords]

This Dan Piraro comic always makes me cry.

[todaysbird]

a rare closeup of a black swift, found throughout north america and small parts of south america. swifts are rarely seen up close; they spend more of their life in air than any other species of bird - they eat, drink, mate and sleep while in flight. they are incapable of perching like other birds; they must cling to vertical surfaces.

(x)