Have you ever gotten angry or lashed out at someone you love, and the reason didn’t have anything to do with them?

Maybe you’ve been bottling up or repressing anger from another part of your life: Frustration about your work, your financial situation, or your health?

If you have, don’t worry, I’ve been there.

A few years ago, I tore my Achilles’ tendon and was in a cast for six weeks. I couldn’t put any weight down on my left foot. I had to use crutches or a knee crutch. I looked like a one-legged pirate.

I became injured at the end of our family vacation and was in lots of pain. Once I came back and received my diagnosis, I was put in a cast and then had six weeks in the summer to deal with getting to work on crutches. Let’s just say it wasn’t fun.

But I also had plans to repaint my son’s room.

I bought the materials, moved all the furniture around, and started the preparation work. I wanted to do all the work because I felt helpless. And I was feeling helpless triggers a lot of childhood memories, where I couldn’t escape what was happening around me. Divorce, lack of money, fear, well, all those things and more are dredged up within me when I feel helpless.

So I took on more responsibility than I needed to and started to paint my son’s room. By the end of the first day, I was exhausted. Working on the knee crutch or just sitting on the ground, putting the blue tape up to protect the baseboards tired me out. A job that I could normally do easily had beaten me.

I needed help.

But instead of asking for help, I kept pushing onward. My wife asked me late that day if I wanted help, and we got into an argument. From her perspective, she didn’t have time to paint as she was working on a consulting job she had. I didn’t want to ask for help and was being selfish and thought I could solve the problem on my own.

But I couldn’t. I needed help.

We came to a compromise and got the work done, and all turned out well.

Yet I didn’t have to make things so complicated.

If I would have taken some time to relax, think through what I could realistically accomplish, and ask for help in advance, we could have come up with a timeline that would have worked for everyone.

I could have taken some time to relax. A small amount of time to think things through, clear my mind, and realize that trying to accomplish everything within an artificial deadline wasn’t going to help anyone. I was being stubborn.

When you go about your day, are you taking time to relax and to carve a small respite for yourself?

Or, like me, do you sometimes rush forward trying to solve problems that aren’t problems?

It’s not easy to let go and to admit how we sometimes react from triggered feelings from childhood.

It feels icky to admit that, and I feel guilty and some shame.

But if you shine a light on those parts of yourself and embrace them, you can find better ways to overcome those challenges.

Like what you’ve read? Be sure to check out my other posts in my Let Go and Be Free blog.