How do you get rid of anger?

On my skin, in my dreams, and through my breath I start to see signs of repressed anger. It might actually be so repressed that I’m not entirely sure what I’m angry over. Which makes it very difficult to know how to unrepress it, let it out, and get rid of it.

The main source of anger in my life has always lain with my father. I could never stop myself from getting really angry at him; to revolt against him and disagree with everything he said and did. It was my way of being a teenager and finding independence, I suppose, but I also feel very strongly that power positions must be challenged. Even if that power position is just a father and husband in a straight, white, middle class family of four. Even if I love and admire this person more than anyone in the world, and want to achieve his pride in me more than I want to achieve anything else. The principle is strong within me: I cannot not question and challenge everything he says and does.

My father is old now. I worry about his health. He holds little or no power or influence over me and the decisions I make in my life. Yet, he is still my father and, as such, I still see him as the King of my childhood. And it makes me angry that I can never usurp him from that power. But the older I get, and the older he gets, I can find more acceptance that he holds that imaginary position in my mind. One day I might even start to accept that he isn’t wrong about absolutely everything; on principle I’ve resisted his sermons and wisdoms and ways of life for over 20 years, but I’m slowly starting to realise that maybe he’s not so bad after all. Maybe, I can let some of his power influence me, and guide me.

Then what am I angry about? If I even am angry?

In the house I now live in, I share with three others whom I love as family. One of them is the godchild of our landlady, is our main link of communication to her, and the one ultimately responsible for the care of the house. This puts them in an indisputable position of influence over the rest of us. Add to this that they’re living here with their longterm partner, who worships and supports them in absolutely everything. While I know that my housemate has no intention or interest in having a more important or powerful position than the rest of us in the house, they still do. Which, I’m starting to realise, is making me very angry.

Still, even if I identify the source of my anger, I don’t know how to let it out and get over it. I don’t want to be angry, I don’t want to hold on to it. Speaking to my housemate about it might help, but I worry that it will open a can of worms that will then spread over the whole house and won’t be undone, and that it will ruin something. I don’t know what the answer is. Writing about it helps. Perhaps speaking to my father will help.

But then again, maybe it’s just something in my diet causing the eczema, weird dreams, and shallow breath.