The Cup Is Just a Cup: Understanding Misplaced Anger, Healing Old Wounds and Breaking the Cycle

By Michael Leunig

Sometimes the argument really is about the cup.

And sometimes it isn't.

A difficult morning. Traffic. Pressure at work. A careless comment. Things we swallow rather than say. Then we arrive home, see an unwashed coffee cup on the side, and suddenly everything spills out.

But how old is that anger?

In The Cup Is Just a Cup, psychotherapist Michael Leunig explores the emotional weight we can carry into ordinary moments and relationships. Drawing on years of therapeutic experience, he invites us to become curious about the difference between what is happening now and what may have travelled with us from somewhere else.

Through the recurring images of the Cup, the Stone, the Window, the Echo and the Bodyguard, the book explores misplaced anger, childhood wounds, shame, boundaries, forgiveness, reconciliation and the possibility of responding differently.

This is not a book about blaming the past for the present. Nor is it an invitation to go digging for trauma.

It is a conversation about understanding what we carry, taking responsibility for what we do with it, and learning not to deliver yesterday's pain to today's address.

Because the person who triggered the pain may not be the person who created it.

And sometimes a cup really is just a cup.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1066965706
• ISBN13: 9781066965700
• Release Date: September 2026
• Publisher: Deeper Paths Press
• Length: 138 Pages
• Weight: 0.37 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 5.5" x 8.5"