In moments of peace or tranquility, we cast about for anger to drive us.
It is more comforting to tack into the wind, expending energy in tragic folly, than to rest adrift.
Tag: anger
- Theme: Self
Anger is a tool
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1–2 minutesAnger is a communication tool. (That means you could handle the situation with a different tactic.)
Anger gets results but is not an uncontrollable response: it is a choice to get what you want.
As a power dynamic, the angry person wants to get into a fight ultimately to force your submission or your irrational anger. Anger moves reason into emotion and forces the relationship into a dominance game.
If you respond with a ‘stiff upper lip’ or ‘grin and bear it’ but you are still angry, you are just controlling it, which can lead to resentment and retaliatory revenge.
The trick is to see their anger as a ploy that will convert you into adversaries. Anger is frustration and a desire to win to avoid fear or insecurity; it is a means to dominate or decimate through emotional manipulation.
- Theme: Culture
Absurdity is willful defiance
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1–2 minutesThe absurd is when your aim does not match your strength or ability, according to Albert Camus.
To charge a wall armed only with anger is absurd.To expect success while ignoring reality is absurd in direct proportion to the scale of your goals. A situation becomes absurd when the odds are infinitesimal, yet the individual persists.
This defiance against reality is equal parts hopeful and bravery, yet also insanity.
- Theme: Self
Wanting makes warmth
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1–2 minutesWe generate the sensation of warmth, nearly visceral, when wanting or being wanted.
Equally hate generates rage, another fire powering, binding and engulfing people.
To not want, to be disinterested is to be “cool,” reptilian.
- Theme: Self
Don’t hurt yourself: vent your anger
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1–2 minutesAnger has a bad reputation: "civilized" people control it, and enlightened people are beyond it.
Obviously, we do not want to give free rein to our anger or inflame it, but it is a natural human response that has been relegated to the realm of "unhealthy."The question is how are you going to vent? I would suggest a community of loving friends, who can allow the outburst and dissipate the toxic energies with love.
- Theme: Self
familiarity breeds contempt
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1–2 minutesIt bears repetition: our familiarity provides a depth of understanding that allows us to despise something/someone in nuanced detail, while our ignorance only allows an abstract vague revulsion.
The more you understand, the more alike you are.
The more alike you are, the more your contempt for them acts as a mirror, reflecting your self-contempt. - Theme: Self
Calm amidst rage: detached observation
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1–2 minutesYou can be fine, even happy, amid anxiety and outrage. These feelings come over us, but we can watch them and not identify with them.
I can’t do it for long, but sometimes when my contentment is attacked, I realize fighting empowers the negativity while simply observing without connecting causes it to dissolve.More importantly, I can only do this when I know I am scared or threatened.
Then I must ask why I fear: nothing can destroy "me," just my attachment to my illusory social standing. - Theme: Self
Therapize Everything
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1–2 minutesWe therapize everything. We use language to displace feelings and concepts, recognizing them by naming them. The naming convention allows solutions through distance, but it also alters self-perception and dissuades real solutions.
For example, your pain and anxiety are diagnosed as depression, yet naming and medicating shifts focus to the individual’s inability to cope, alleviating the need to alter the more extensive societal structure of poverty that generates chronic anxiety.
For example, your rage against the machine is justified, but rather than harnessing that empowering emotion for change, you should cultivate self-love until you can bear the brutality.