Control
Your Anger Before It Controls You
Anger is a completely normal, usually healthy, human
emotion. But getting angry is not going to fix anything, that it won't make you
feel better (and may actually make you feel worse). And when it gets out of
control and turns destructive, it can lead to problems—problems at work, in
your personal relationships, and in the overall quality of your life.
There is a story about a father who cannot control his anger:
This is a true story that happened in the States.
A man came out of his home to admire his new truck. To his puzzlement, his
3-year-old son was happily hammering dents into the shiny paint.
The man ran to his son, knocked him away, and hammered the little boy's hands into a pulp as punishment. When the father calmed down, he rushed his son to the hospital. Although the doctor tried desperately to save the crushed bones, he finally had to amputate the fingers from both the boy's hands.
When the boy woke up from the surgery and saw his bandaged stubs, he innocently asked, "Daddy, I'm sorry about your truck, but when are my fingers going to grow back?"
The father went home and committed suicide.
Think about the story the next time before you express your
anger. It may only get a minute to get angry, but it also may make you regret
until the rest of your life.
There are some tips how to control your anger.
RELAXATION
Some simple steps you can try:
- Breathe deeply, from your diaphragm; breathing from your chest won't relax you. Picture your breath coming up from your "gut."
- Slowly repeat a calm word or phrase such as "relax," "take it easy." Repeat it to yourself while breathing deeply.
- Use imagery; visualize a relaxing experience, from either your memory or your imagination.
- Nonstrenuous, slow yoga-like exercises can relax your muscles and make you feel much calmer.
Practice these techniques daily. Learn to use them
automatically when you're in a tense situation.
CHANGING THE WAY
YOU THINK
Try replacing the exaggerated and overly dramatic
thoughts with more rational ones. For instance, instead of telling yourself,
"oh, it's awful, it's terrible, everything's ruined," tell yourself,
"it's frustrating, and it's understandable that I'm upset about it, but
it's not the end of the world and getting angry is not going to fix it
anyhow."
Be careful of words like "never" or
"always" when talking about yourself or someone else. "This
!&*%@ machine never works," or "you're always forgetting
things" are not just inaccurate, they also serve to make you feel that
your anger is justified and that there's no way to solve the problem.
Logic defeats anger, because anger, even when it's
justified, can quickly become irrational.
PROBLEM SOLVING
Remember getting angry is not going to fix anything. So
instead of putting an anger, save your energy to think how to solve the
problem.
BETTER
COMMUNICATION
When you start to get angry, hold yourself, don't say the
first thing that comes into your head, but slow down and think carefully about
what you want to say. At the same time, listen carefully to what the other
person is saying and take your time before answering.
After arranging the words, start your conversation calmly.
It will go to a better solution rather than only win your arguments.
USING HUMOR
"Silly humor" can help defuse rage in a number of
ways. When you get angry and call someone a name or refer to them in some
imaginative phrase, stop and picture what that word would literally look like.
If you're at work and you think of a coworker as a
"dirtbag" or a "single-cell life form," for example,
picture a large bag full of dirt (or an amoeba) sitting at your colleague's
desk, talking on the phone, going to meetings. Do this whenever a name comes
into your head about another person. If you can, draw a picture of what the
actual thing might look like. This will take a lot of the edge off your fury;
and humor can always be relied on to help unknot a tense situation.
CHANGING YOUR ENVIRONMENT
Sometimes it's our immediate surroundings that give us cause
for irritation and fury. Problems and responsibilities can weigh on you and
make you feel angry at the "trap" you seem to have fallen into and
all the people and things that form that trap.
Give yourself a break. Make sure you have some
"personal time" scheduled for times of the day that you know are
particularly stressful. One example is the working mother who has a standing
rule that when she comes home from work, for the first 15 minutes "nobody
talks to Mom unless the house is on fire." After this brief quiet time,
she feels better prepared to handle demands from her kids without blowing up at
them.
SOME OTHER TIPS
FOR EASING UP ON YOURSELF
Timing: If you
and your spouse tend to fight when you discuss things at night—perhaps you're
tired, or distracted, or maybe it's just habit—try changing the times when you
talk about important matters so these talks don't turn into arguments.
Avoidance: If
your child's chaotic room makes you furious every time you walk by it, shut the
door. Don't make yourself look at what infuriates you. Don't say, "well,
my child should clean up the room so I won't have to be angry!" That's not
the point. The point is to keep yourself calm.
Finding alternatives:
If your daily commute through traffic leaves you in a state of rage and
frustration, give yourself a project—learn or map out a different route, one
that's less congested or more scenic. Or find another alternative, such as a
bus or commuter train.
