I thought the woman honked at me because she thought there was enough space for me to get into the traffic…but I didn’t think so, so I didn’t go…they were going too fast and there wasn’t enough space/time. I assumed she honked because she was telling me to go, dive right in there…but cars were coming too fast, too close, in my opinion.

I was pissed because everyone here in the suburb where I live drives like maniacs—fast, reckless…and there’s constant accidents. I didn’t want to have an accident so I stayed at the stopsign and didn’t pull into the traffic cuz it wasn’t clear for me to go.

I can see that I was pissed because I took her honking as a sign of irritated annoyance with me…but who knows what her real deal was…I get what you’re saying that I was making assumptions about what she was thinking. At the time, I was pissed because I assumed the woman was annoyed with me and didn’t seem concerned that I was going to get hit if I pulled into traffic. Before she honked, I felt overwhelmed—like this huge surge of traffic wasn’t going to let up and I didn’t know when I was going to get to merge…I felt stuck, irritated, and generally pissed off that my husband was such a f*ck up as to throw our marriage down the toilet and cause me to move back here to this dump…it was kinda a chain of thoughts that led me back to “I wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for you!!! (my ex husband)”

So what you’re saying is that when I get triggered like that, I need to identify the emotion, think about the situation for a bit, and then act in a more appropriate manner? And to not make assumptions about what people are thinking/why they’re doing the things they do? And the most important thing—when something like that happens, I should think for a moment before I get out of the car and beat somebody down—I should ask myself if it’s going to be important tomorrow or something like that…and not react. It sounds like something I can do…..but what do I do with this rage that’s at the heart of everything…which I think is my divorce/moving back here…How do I not have that kinda seething below the surface all the time??? i don't feel particlarly angry or angry all the time, but now that I think about it, I realize that the anger towards my ex is constant, just below the surface.