How Angry Are You?
By: Susan J Hilger
Tags: Anger, Mental Health, Expression, Healthy, Coaching

Anger is healthy; Anger is also Messy, Anger moves us into action.

Anger is still a tough topic for me. It wasn’t too long ago that I had zero room for anger in any setting. I was obnoxious in the way I’d shut down any conversation going in that direction. I was so afraid of it.

The first time I walked into my therapist’s office, I got a crash course in feelings and emotions. Why? Because me and my emotions had not seen each other in a very long time. Emotions bring pain, they’re powerful, they are so messy.

My therapist was well versed in depressed and pained people. He could see I was cut off from my own emotions. My heart was not accepting anything emotional, and it stayed that way for years. My dad had PTSD, he drowned it with alcohol or tried to, and his temper was freaking scary.

Growing up in my house meant the kids didn’t have the personal freedom of expression, particularly anger and sometimes tears. Consequently, I had no idea how to be angry, how to even begin to express it and had never seen it expressed in any healthy fashion.

We tend to suppress this one because it’s not widely appreciated and accepted AND because not all of us are well versed in how to express it in a manner that is socially well received.

Today I am so grateful that I know how to identify and feel anger. Anger can be the best motivator and often will catapult us into action. Anger is also a great release of feelings that can otherwise make us implode.

When we encounter angry emotions in others, we are challenged by it, not always clear on their ‘why’ or it’s origin, or a person’s anger history, if you will.

When we experience these emotions and reactions in ourselves or others, we generally don’t ‘feel’ good, and they emit an unsavory vibe. We also tend to jump to judgement about the person resisting or showing us true frustration. What is wrong with me? or them? The key is to understand our emotion and be able to choose to respond rather than react.

We are also regularly reminded to align with our values, stay and be present, practice mindfulness. So none of these consistent messages help us to deal with our catabolic energy when it ‘rises up’ inside of us.

Catabolic energy is essentially the energy our body uses to react to stress. I think of it as resistance or opposition, frustration or a tendency to blame others, maybe even fight or flight.

Sometimes a client may come to a session feeling disappointed with the amount of frustration or anger they feel, when in truth, that anger gave this person the motivation, energy and mental grace to stand up for themselves or fight their way to ‘survival’ of something harmful.

Not too long ago, a friend shared a powerful story of how she dug out of a long term marriage of verbal and emotional abuse. First she had to get really pissed off. Her anger was the catalyst that helped her to walk away from the abuse. She grew tired of staying in an abusive marriage, and her anger set her free. Today she facilitates helping other women in challenging relationships to take their own personal power back to create the same content and fulfilling life. Her anger served her well in this instance.

I have come to realize that anger serves us well if expressed in a healthy manner. This may take learning and training to understand that randomly lashing out at others has unwanted consequences. My therapist offered me this: “When you say or do …. it makes me feel angry.” What this does is offer someone the opportunity to hear you, to understand you, AND you to express your feelings without being quieted. Nobody can tell you your feelings are incorrect because your feelings are your own. They can, however, refuse to respond to any inappropriate behavior caused by your anger, and that negates your message.

Today in our current world environment, we are seeing all forms of anger being expressed. It caused me to sit back and think again about how to addres this topic. The truth is, we all need to feel and express anger, it’s useful when done well, and it’s dangerous to withhold our emotions. I do know this.

Our children need to understand it’s okay to get mad, our society needs to allow for it, and we need to teach and learn the emotionally intelligent way to share our feelings when anger is seeping in. Otherwise anger becomes an erruption of noise and wrong words spoken, the message gets lost and the anger doesn’t serve us.

Photo by David Garrison