Advice for an Empath Recovering From Narcissistic Abuse: The Necessity of Rage

I’d venture to say that over half the human population has felt or currently has something that triggers rage from within them. And, for many of us, we have never been taught how to deal with this complex affectual experience. In fact, most of us don’t understand what rage is, or are terrified when trying to deal with it, when it appears. This way of relating to rage, unfortunately becomes the Achilles heal for most, and especially Empaths.

Rage is an expression of despair, fear, disgust, shame, and deep (and often overwhelming) anger. Rage is a visceral experience just as much as an emotional experience. It is a feeling that often gets “triggered” by a perceived or real boundary violation, threat of abandonment or neglect, or threat of something traumatic occurring, for the self, or to someone or something we care about.

Often, those who have experienced several traumatic experiences in their life, usually based in the context of relationships, carry and experience rage. It may take actually very little, if not just the right “trigger”, to ignite rage. And, these people may feel overwhelmed and not know how to manage it. There are internalizing and externalizing expressions of this rage…