When was the last time something properly pissed you off?
This week I'm in a tech-induced rage. Every single piece of technology I rely on for work, life, and dissociating from the current state of the world has gone completely cattywampus (my new favourite word).
I thought this week we'd talk about something familiar to all of us but rarely discussed in depth: anger.
In my childhood, I was raised to believe that anger was an unacceptable emotion. What I mean by that is that any time I was angry, my parents either weren't happy about it or immediately wanted to "fix the problem" to make me less angry. Now this is far from uncommon... (here's an interesting reflection question: how did your family respond to you when you were angry as a child?)
As a result I learned what my parents also likely learned growing up: that joy is a "good" emotion to have and anger is a "bad" emotion to have. As a result, I spent a lot of time trying to push anger down, aside, or away instead of feeling it.
As I grew up, studied psychology and emotions, and went to a lot of therapy, I now know that not only is anger not a "bad" emotion (spoiler: NO emotions are "bad" emotions) but it's actually an incredibly important messenger.
Anger tells us that something we've experienced is unjust, that there is a problem that needs to be solved, and is highly motivational in pushing us to find a solution.
Think of the last time you were angry...
What were you angry about? What was the situation at hand? What felt unjust, wrong, or made you feel compelled to take immediate action?
If you're like me and as a child you weren't taught what anger meant or how to express it in a healthy and helpful way, anger can be very confusing and overwhelming.
Unhelpful expressions of anger can be:
Pretending everything is okay when it isn't
Lashing out at or blaming others (whether in person, on social media, or otherwise), hitting/throwing things, or "explosive" bursts of anger
Pushing anger down and "imploding" (aka getting angry with yourself even if the problem is outside of you)
If you do any (or all) of these things, here are some things you can do to help:
Take a deep breath. Sometimes we don't notice we're angry until we burst, and taking a DEEP breath can help us think before we act.
Take a break. Anger can be helpful, but if you feel like you're about to express it in one of the above three ways, maybe it's time to get some fresh air and hit pause. One way you can take a break from a heated conversation for instance is to say, "I want to have this conversation non-reactively, so I'm going to go for a walk and then can we talk about this?"
Notice how sensations in your body change with anger. Anger can show up as feelings of heat, heart rate elevation, and a tight chest (kind of like you're a kettle about to boil- which you might be). The sooner you can become aware of these feelings, the easier it is to take a break and then use anger helpfully.
Ask yourself: what is the problem that really needs to be solved here? What has happened that feels unjust? Oftentimes we want to project anger at the nearest available target. That doesn't mean the nearest available target is actually the root of the problem.
And lastly, once you've taken a breath, a break, noticed sensations in your body, and identified the problem, who can you turn to for support? Sometimes we need a hype human, but anger is already a hyped-up emotion. Who can you talk to about the problem to find resolution calmly and responsively, rather than explosively?
I'm currently working on these five things when I notice anger emerging... and it's really, really hard. When I first started practicing this with my therapist, I felt deeply uncomfortable, and wrong somehow.
But remember- we live in a society where we're told which emotions are "acceptable" which are not. You are HUMAN. You are an emotional being who just occasionally thinks, and it's important that we learn how to identify and express our emotions in a way that hurts neither ourselves nor others.
....So I'm learning how to feel angry at technology, troubleshoot my tech issues, and NOT throw my laptop at the wall. It's a struggle. But I think I can do it *twitches*.