woman or whether it would be better to call the police immediately. I said I couldn’t tell her what to do, but asked her to find out how important a rig or anything else was at this point in hr life. “You don’t understand,” she said. “This was my grandmother’s ring. I used to wear it every day until I got ill and my hands became too swollen. It’s more than just a ring to me. How can I not b upset?” The quickness of her response and the anger and defensiveness in her voice were indications that she had not yet become present enough to look within and to disentangle her reaction from the event and observe them both. Her anger and defensiveness were signs that the ego was still speaking through her. I said, “I am going to ask you a few questions, but instead of answering them now, see if you can find the answers within you. I will pause briefly after each question. When an answer comes, it may not necessarily come in the form of words
Anger is more destructive than any force in the human world. Uncontrolled anger destroys health, relationships, families, businesses, and societies, and is the chief generator of wars, revolutions, and social conflict. The primary cause of anger can be traced back to destructive criticism in early childhood. Whenever a person is criticized, he reacts exactly as if he is being attacked, with defensiveness and re- sentment. Since any behavior that you repeat over and over be- comes a habit, many people develop the habit of responding with anger to every problem, disappointment, or frustration they expe- rience. Eventually, they reach the point where they are always an- gry about something. To become angry, a person must be able to blame someone for
" That's where we get our word clue. A clue is a thread that a seeker traces back to a center, looking for answers or order. T h e skeins of thread that connect one heart to another may be the vital clue that solves a mystery or resolves a conflict. C R I S I S OF T H E H E A R T T h e Ordeal can be a crisis of the heart. In a story of romance it might be the moment of greatest intimacy, something we all desire and yet fear. Perhaps what's dying here is a hero's defensiveness. In another story it might be a dark moment in the romance when the hero experiences betrayal or the apparent death of the relationship. Joseph Campbell describes what we might call the romantic branches of the Ordeal in two chapters of The Hero with a Thousand Faces called "Meeting with the Goddess" and " W o m a n as Temptress." As he says, "the ultimate adventure... is commonly represented as a mystical m a r r i a g e . . . the crisis at the nadir, the zenith, or
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