Flipping S***

When I don't know what I'm doing in the car, like if I don't know where I am going, I flip a shit. Combine this with traffic, poor drivers, a full working day, as well as my timid under practiced driving and a lot of shit is flipped in my 2010 Chevy Malibu. Yesterday I met some coworkers for drinks and couldn't find where the bar was right away, plus people suck at driving on Big Beaver because they all apparently need to get home and defuse a bomb or something. It was then that I realized, when I am stressed while driving, I turn into the worst person I could possibly be. I say racist things, sexist things, homophobic things and if I'm not saying them I'm thinking them as I scream other things. There is a general peace that is about me, and when I am stressed out it seems to rupture - and nothing I stand for is safe anymore. This is extremely worrisome to me because it makes me wonder about the genuine nature of these beliefs, but not in the sense that I don't genuinely believe them, rather where they come from, where they go, and why they aren't always with me.

I generally advocate forward thinking, I want nothing more that the acknowledgment of inequality and a collective move towards a solution to a bigger problem - a sickness - that plagues the American Culture I love (not sarcastically either, I love America). Why then, do I scream "OF. FUCKING. COURSE" when a polite looking Indian family almost, completely unbeknownst to them, kills me on the expressway? I can't simply just get mad at bad driving, I have to assign their bad driving to the most obvious quality about them. Like I'm trying to really hurt them. I'll point out here that people might give some shoddy explanation about the "truth" of stereotypes, that's fine they can think that, but my point goes deeper; if I never adhere to this implicit racism in my day to day, why do I seem to devolve into it in moments where I am incredibly stressed out? Also, there is no longer a censor, words you couldn't pay me to say are all of a sudden free flowing. I don't condone stereotyping or saying words arbitrarily because we don't think they are bad, I understand that words have meaning and can be a harmful act. This of course does not stop them from blurting out.

This is a hard thing to admit. I get so easily flustered when I'm lost or someone does something infuriatingly ignorant when I'm already stressed out. It boils down to my deep seeded fear of tardiness and my even more seeded fear of disappointing other people or letting them down in some way. I can't seem to overcome this feeling, as much as I try to force myself to think positively, to come back to myself in a sense,depending on the stress level; I can't. I'd really like to work on this, I'd like to exhibit self control whenever I feel this stress boil up in me. I'd like to level with myself, look at myself in the mirror and tell myself to settle down. The problem is; I never get a chance, it just happens. Fast. I wish I had the solution, but I don't and it is throwing me into a panic. I don't like who I become in the car, afterwards I have to break things down and convince myself that I didn't mean what I said or what I thought.

One time I saw a woman walking out of a yoga class, she was the picture of zen; her face held a relaxed smile, her walk was casual, and she seemed as though she had just finished sighing a gigantic sigh of relief....when a car speeding by almost clipped her. At this time, she proceeded to fill the air with expletives and her middle finger and a whole lot of "negative vibes". I bring this up because I think people in my generational category will try to forward me information about yogic culture, or eastern religions, or breathing techniques and meditation. It's not as though I'm completely unwilling to try these things, but the random and primal nature of these...attacks...makes it difficult to simply breathe through them, seeing as they are over almost as soon as they start. It seems like yoga is a great way to selfishly unwind after a long work week, but that its abilities are futile against any everyday instances that might insta-boil your blood. In that sense, these eastern culture remedies are more like detox diets and less like adrenaline shots.

No. The judgement comes from a deeper part of me, one that wants to hurt people. This is how I've managed to reconcile with it thus far; by convincing myself that I don't really belief the terrible things I think and say, but that my brain births them from a desire to harm my "aggressor". My question then, is what I need to do to relax this desire to do harm to others mentally, to go for blood. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know. And as always,

Thanks for Listening