Dr Elizabeth Celi's Blog
Do you see red? 10 steps to anger management
Let’s get one thing straight. Anger is a normal emotion. It’s how it’s managed and expressed that matters. Anger management is something men and women need to learn as a key psychological skill.
People seem to consciously or unconsciously aim to “never be angry”, which is unrealistic given we can’t escape feeling angry at times. Mostly people try to be rid of anger forever, because they have a fear of confrontation. Who doesn’t?! Confrontation is not a pleasant thing and most people don’t enjoy it.
Where people undo themselves is incorrectly interpreting having a disagreement, which may involve a lot of feelings such as frustration, anger and discomfort, as “confrontation”. This doesn’t need to be the case. It’s more a matter of managing uncomfortable feelings and circumstances while the matter is being nutted out.
A key area where anger is misunderstood is men's anger.
Anger is such an important gateway to other underlying emotions and concerns for men that it's unrealistic and unfair to ignore it or get scared of it. Unfortunately many misinterpret that mens anger will equate to violent behaviour of some sort, sometimes even men themselves.
Both men and women who haven’t learned to manage their anger can be dangerous to others, let’s not kid ourselves. Jumping to conclusions that only mens anger is dangerous is not helping anyone to acknowledge this normal emotion is a signal that something isn’t right. So learning to manage it and harness it’s energy for productive use is important for both men and women.
A media interview I did with the Herald Sun Body and Soul goes through more point for “How men can beat their anger” – click here to read the article
10 steps to managing anger and seeing RED..... in a good way!
For all of us, if anger is in the mix, what then?
- Acknowledge that anger is a normal emotion
- Recognize that anger is a naturally heated and energising emotion. Think about it, it hardly makes us want to go to sleep in a flash does it?
- Realise that the heat and energy of anger can be a reactive explosion in the moment or it can be a signal that there’s something important going on for you internally.
- If you choose the former option, inevitably you’ll have a whole lot of mess to clean up, which will take more time and energy than if you do step 5 instead!
- By choosing the latter option of point 3, that is recognise it’s a signal for something important, you then realise that you can control the anger, the anger doesn’t control you.
- How do you manage it and harness it?
- See a big red STOP sign in your imagination and do what it says – “STOP”!
- Breathe deep, acknowledge you’re angry and that it’s a normal emotion
- Take 10 deep breaths before even trying to understand your anger. This will take all of 1-2 minutes. If you can’t give yourself 1-2 minutes, then prepare to waste more time cleaning up the mess mentioned in point 4.
- Avoid spitting out words or directing your anger energy to anyone in anyway at this moment. No matter how tempting it is, the cons outweigh the benefits
- After the 10 breaths, has the anger energy dissipated a little? I’m not saying gone away but has the edge come off? If not, another 10 breaths please! If you haven’t yet learnt to sit with the anger energy to the point that you control it, rather than it control you, then you won’t have had the chance to develop the ability to appropriately reason during your anger energy, so don’t kid yourself.
- Once the anger energy has dissipated, ask yourself what got you so angry.
- What was said? What was done?
- What is how it was said?
- What bothers you about it so much?
- By getting some answers to these questions, you already have the material to manage the situation and person/s that triggered off your anger.
9. Formulate some non-blaming and informative statements that include the answers you came up with in point 8. For example, “I got angry when I heard you say …..” or “When someone says….., I get angry because…..”
10. Consider whether saying something now is necessary and as urgent as the anger makes you think it is. Sometimes waiting till tomorrow or 1-2 days, when you’ve slept on it, can help you express the underlying concern that showed itself as anger.
Be careful though, if you don’t address it at all, make sure it’s because you’ve worked it out within yourself and chosen to let go of the anger, genuinely. If you’re storing it just to use as ammunition a few weeks, months or years down the track, then not only are you giving anger a home to eat you up inside, you’re also diminishing the quality of your relationship when you bring it up out of context later on.
A psychologist can help you learn what your anger is trying to tell you and how you can best manage it.
Remember, anger is an energising emotion and so being able manage the intense energy and harness it for productive use is like turning yourself into a solar panel! You learn to work with your anger and make it a win/win for anyone involved without unnecessary mess to clean up.
Cheers,
Dr. Elizabeth Celi
Photo above courtesy of photostock, image obtained at - http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=2125
Posted by Dr. Elizabeth Celi on 12th February, 2012 | Comments (1) | Trackbacks
Tags: womens anger, mens anger, emotions, anger, anger and men, anger management
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