By YAGI OLAGUERA

Discussed: The monster within, regret, violence, pent up aggression

I never really thought of myself as an angry person. I’d like to think that I’m pretty laid back and most of the people who know me would agree with me. While I can be pretty moody at times – a curse acquired from having been born while the Sun was in Cancer – I am pretty patient. Even during those rare times when I do find myself at the end of my proverbial rope, I would much rather walk away and come back to the situation when I can deal with it logically. I also try to be aware of what I say or do all the time to make sure that I don’t get into unwanted arguments.

Constantly keeping myself in check all the time does have its drawbacks however. It can be a problem socially because that same part of me that likes to keep quiet also likes to over think things too much. I end up second-guessing myself a lot making certain conversations a little bit more awkward than they should be. It also manifests itself as shyness which is more often than not construed as aloofness or coldness depending on the situation.

And then I found alcohol.

I love to drink. Especially during social situations, it’s much easier for me to throw that guardedness out the window. I’m wound pretty tightly most of the time and I’ve found that few things can help me relax as having a cold beer. I’m a lot more open when I’m drunk and it’s easier for me express excitement and passion when I’ve had a few drinks in me.

This passion does occasionally swing to the negative end of the spectrum however. I can be a pain when I’m drunk. I tend to tell long-winded lectures about the most unlikely things whenever I’ve had the right amount to drink. I once blabbered on and on to someone I had just met about Michel Focault’s Discipline and Punishement and how it seemed to have influenced Isis’s then new album Panopticon. The poor bastard thought he was making small talk by asking me what I was listening to at the moment. He never talked to me again that night after he disengaged himself.

The right amount of alcohol can also turn me into a belligerent bastard. As much as I hate arguments when I’m sober, I really, really hate to back down from one when I’ve had the right amount of sauce in me. I once got into a relatively loud shouting match with a friend about The Passion of the Christ of all things. When I’m drunk, even passing opinions that I don’t normally feel strongly about turn into gospel truths that I will defend to the death.

Embarrassing situations can eventually be forgotten and drunken pseudo-philosophical arguments can easily be forgiven, especially when both parties don’t even remember it happening. The whole forgive and forget thing isn’t so easy though when drunken arguments escalate into actual violence, especially when you end up physically hurting someone you love.

It happened to me at a friend’s birthday party. I was getting quite sloshed with whatever concoction it was that they were serving that night. Everyone was having a pretty good time until I ended up in a small argument with my then girlfriend of almost two years. I don’t even remember what the fight was about but I do remember feeling that I was right about it and of course there was no way that I was backing down.

My drunken logic was telling me that I was being pretty reasonable so she must not be listening to what I was saying. Whenever I feel like I’m not being listened to, I tend to raise my voice. Raising my voice wouldn’t make her listen to what I thought was reason however so my voice just got louder. When my voice couldn’t get any louder, I did the only thing that I felt would make her listen at that point. I shoved her. And god damn it, I shoved her pretty damn hard. I’m a big guy and like everyone, I’m a lot stronger than I think I am when I’m in a drunken rage so needless to say, I hurt her.

She of course broke up with me the day after that and I couldn’t agree more with that decision. I don’t believe that there can ever be an excuse for physical violence, especially if it’s against the woman you love. I loathe myself for ever crossing that line. When she asked for us to get back together, I did what I believed was the right thing by not doing so. I could no longer trust myself with her. If I could ever hurt her like that, there’s no telling what else I could do.

I could never understand how I could ever sink that low. I have always believed that there’s never really a reason to fight and that all issues can be resolved with the right amount of dialogue and empathy. I stuck with those beliefs for most of my life. I grew up witnessing my mother play Switzerland to my perpetually warring aunts and uncles,  so listening to every side of the story was a quality that I learned to value very early on. Plus, as flawed as we Cancerians are, we are nothing if we’re not empathetic.

In spite of our aspirations and beliefs, we are judged more for what we actually do. As much as I can say that it felt like it was an entirely different person doing that action, there is still no denying the fact that I did what I did and that action will forever be a part of who I am.

Another drunken incident would help me realize that I actually had some pretty serious rage issues. I once drank myself into a concussion. Well, the drinking didn’t actually directly cause the injury but it did make me miss the wall I was trying to lean against. The concussion was actually caused by me trying to break my fall with my head. I don’t remember any of this because concussions come with mild amnesia, but I was told that I ungratefully fought with my friends who were trying to get me to the hospital. To make matters worse, when my dad came to pick me up, I unloaded a whole shitload of long forgotten daddy issues in front of those same friends.

While the first reaction was to blame things on the drinking, I knew that there was something deeper than that. While it’s true that drinking helped trigger my turning into a monster it wasn’t the actual root of my rage. I took a hard look at myself and I eventually accepted that the rage and violence was a part of who I am.

Acknowledging that violence in me did help me know myself significantly better. While physically hurting someone in rage only happened that one time, I did realize that my violence manifests itself quite often but in completely different ways. I realized that I hurt people when I raised my voice at them and I also hurt them when I was being a passive aggressive douche.

While it continually bothers me that I am capable of such violence, slowly coming to terms with the regret has forced me to change how I deal with things. I’ve learned to express whatever I’m feeling at the moment instead of keeping it in and letting it build up into a rage. I’ve also learned to face difficult confrontations and not run away from them. Most importantly, I’ve learned to accept that I don’t have to be right all the time. That significantly mellowed me out.

Knowing that I am capable of such rage still scares me though and I’ve realized that it has affected how I relate to people. It’s quite difficult to be truly open when you’re desperately hiding something in shame. As sorry as I am, I don’t expect to be forgiven by the other party for what I’ve done. I believe however that my redemption must start with me forgiving myself.

In the tarot deck, the five of cups is the card that symbolizes regret. It pictures a man looking at two (or three, depending on the deck) cups that have spilled over. The man in the card fails to notice however that he has what’s left of the five cups still full and intact behind him. It’s taken a while for me to completely own up to what I did by talking about it openly. It’s high time that I leave that behind and figure out what’s inside the cups I have left intact.


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Yagi Olaguera is the lead singer of the testosterone laden heavy metal act, Cog, one of the few bands that can simply walk into Mordor.

When he is not moonlighting as a contributor for New Slang (“Music, Girls, and How Ol’ Dirty Bastard Ruined My High School Life“) or as a ghost writer for women’s fashion magazines, he is guiding foreign students through the many nuances and intricacies of English as a second language. He tumbls here.