Exploring Mind - Body - Spirit

Topics covered

• Anger is different from rage
• Releasing rage
• Dealing with anger
• Reducing anger

Anger is different from rage

It is helpful if we distinguish anger from rage. Anger is an emotional response to a situation where we or someone we care about is being harmed, or at risk of being harmed. Rage is the impulse to act destructively in reponse to the anger. Anger and rage serve a protective response in nature. Together they are the "fight" in the "flight/fight/freeze" response to danger. If an animal is trying to eat us, then anger and rage can help us escape. However, in more complex situations rage leads to behaviors which make the situation worse.

Anger is a natural reponse when we or someone else is being threatened. Getting rid of anger is not helpful. We need to make sure that anger does not lead to rage, and if it does so then we release the rage without being destructive. That is, we will get angry from time to time, but we need not feel the urge to act destructively, and if we do we need to channel that impulse in a non-destructive manner.

Releasing rage

When something has triggered anger it is common for us to want to act destructively. This urge or impulse to act is like an energy that can control our behaviors. The impulse, rage, can cause us to say and do things which we are sorry for later. Suppressing the impulse does not work well because it simply goes deeper and recruits more and more cognitive and emotional resources and expresses itself in other behaviors, which are destructive, but not as obvious. Passive-aggressive behaviors are and example of this.

It is helpful for us to acknowlege that we are angry and feel the urge to hurt something. Once we acknowlege that we can do something to release the energy in the impulse without acting destructively. If we feel the impulse physically, like we want to smash or rend something, then it is helpful to do something that burns up that energy. Working out, tensing and releasing our muscles as we breathe are examples of this. It can help if we imagine the physical energy coming out of our body as we do the physical activity. It is NOT helpful to hit something. That simply reinforces the urge to act destructively. Mindless, repetitive activity like pushups or skipping rope, seems best. It is like our body is saying, "Something just attacked you! ACT NOW!" So if we use our muscles vigorously then we satisfy that need to move and the rage dissipates.

If the impulse shows up in our thoughts, then physical activity may not be helpful. A technique for this is to purge the toxic thoughts into a written form, say on paper or into a word processor. We let them out stream of consciousness and they do not have to be coherent. Paper is better for this than typing because sometimes the thoughts do not come out in well formed letter. After releasing the toxic thoughts we destroy the material immediately. We do not save it any more than we save toxic waste. We do not reread the material. Doing that would be like eating our own vomit. Purge the thoughts and destroy the material. I refer to this as cathartic journalling.

Dealing with anger

Once we have released enough rage so that the impulse to act destructively does not control us, we need to deal with the anger. If we don't then the rage will return. To deal with anger we have to look for something that happened that we did not want to happen, or something that did not happen that we wanted to happen. There may be several of these and they may be ongoing. We want to be aware of what leads to anger and not ignore it. Anger is a symptom that something needs to change. We need to make sure that we act to make constructive changes.

When we explore our anger we often find that other emotions are occurring as well. We realize that sadness or fear occurred first and anger showed up after that. If that is the case then we need to find a way to deal with the sadness or fear. I recall working with someone whose close relative was dying of cancer. She talked about how angry she was feeling all the time. I pointed out that her eyes were tearing as she said this and asked her to see if she was really sad. She burst into tears and was able to talk about how sad she felt that this was happening and that nothing could be done. As she accepted the sadness she felt the anger dissipate and she was able to think of ways that she could be helpful to her relative and to other relatives who were grieving this situation. This gave her a number of constructive things she was able to do.

A thorough discussion on dealing with anger would probably fill a book. So I will summarize by saying that anger is a call to action and should not be ignored. However, in order to act constructively we need to explore the situation and ourselves deeply and avoid judgments and stereotyping that justify destructive actions. What feels good in the moment is rarely useful in the long-run.

Reducing anger

Anger is a symptom that something needs to change. But often what needs to change is us. If we find ourselves getting angry often, then we need to look at how we are relating to our environment. We need to look for expectations that are unreasonable or wants that we have mistakenly labeled as needs. Mindfulness practice is useful for this. In mindfulness we explore our thoughts, attraction and aversion, and our way of being in the world. All those can influence our emotional responses to situations. As we learn to reduce our reactivity and develop more equanimity, then we don't get angry over stuff that doesn't matter. Sure, it may irritate us, but we can shrug that off. That enables us to save our energy for the things that do matter so we can deal with them appropriately.