To Be Or Not To Be: Angry

If anger is a sin then we are all sinners. A world without anger is as likely as a world without air. Does that mean, however, that we should never try to work on ourselves to improve our temperament?

Few of us have gone through life without occasional disappointment in ourselves over an exaggerated outburst of anger. Apologizing for losing one’s temper means we know it was the wrong thing to do but that rarely stops us from losing our temper again in future. It is the one imperfection we can all readily admit to, yet it is the one flaw we will all likely take to our graves - at least to some extent.

So is that it? Well, not quite.

To go deeper we need to start from a place of acceptance. No self improvement can ever take place without it. Anger is a part of who we are – it is a symptom of the human condition. It is always, in one form or another, a reaction to the environment around us – whether the immediate scene unfolding in the here and now, or some experiences from the past that are resurrecting in the present moment. Either way, the starting point is to understand that the source is never us at our deepest core level of self. But we live in the world and so we will react to it, and part of this reaction is the inevitability of anger. Nevertheless, none of this means that we should take a pass on the ongoing work of keeping our anger under check. It is a balancing act, albeit one we will likely never perfect.

What is perfect? Well given that sadness, fear, pain and disappointment are inevitable in life, there are two ways we can process our consequently arising anger; the right way and the wrong way. The wrong way is to eject, suppress or distract. We can eject it outwards through shouting, disruption or violence or we can suppress it inside and try to pretend we’re not really perturbed and everything is fine. Suppression, however, is merely a delayed form of ejection as, one way or another, through more subtle but equally disruptive behaviours later down the line, we will bring it out. The other wrong way is distraction and that is trying to anaesthetise ourselves out of the situation with drink, drugs or sex.

The right way, on the other hand, is to face and be with the anger. I am talking here about an internal process – one in which we allow ourselves to feel the pain, almost in a physical way, inside of us - to hold it and not be afraid of it (many meditation techniques are useful here, but just being still and feeling the deep sensations within the body is a good start). This way we are truly processing it. It’s not fun at first and there is always resistance (as is the case with all self awareness and meditation techniques in the outset), but in time it begins to transform into something we can handle, and in fact we will be truly growing from it at a deeper level. The processing will then allow us to openly and calmly address the cause of our anger. By doing it this way – without the high emotion and volatility that comes with uninhibited anger – we can be far more effective in getting our point across. So, sure, say you’re angry, be open about what has made you angry, express yourself assertively, but without rancour.

Now, I say this is the right way, but the fact is we won’t always manage it. Sometimes – either because of what’s just happened or some issues bubbling up from our past – we will overreact. That is inevitable too. We should not then go on to overly punish ourselves when we do, or we will just perpetuate the cycle. Acknowledge the overreaction, feel the disappointment, accept yourself for the way you are, but never cease to strive for change.