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A good anger management trick
Tuesday, 27 June 2006
We all get angry sometimes and “lose it”. Good things rarely come from such episodes. Wouldn’t it be better if we could deal with the world more rationally, and keep negative emotions out of it all? Here’s a good trick for doing just that.
What I’m specifically looking at here is short-term anger, or “flare-ups”. This is when we suddenly get furious and do things we regret. For longer-term underlying anger, the best strategy is forgiveness, which I cover in this article.
The first thing to deal with in stopping yourself becoming angry, is realizing that it’s not a good strategy for getting what you want. Many people use anger as a kind of negotiation tactic. They think if they start yelling, and so on, they’re more likely to get what they want. This is learned very early in life, and can be a hard habit to overcome.
The problem is, that such a strategy rarely works. And when it does, it comes with hidden costs.
It’s true that a lot of people out there are wimps, and will cave-in if you fume at them - but many aren’t and such tactics won’t work with them. Even those who give in to fury, will resent you for it. And you’ll embarrass those around you.
If you’re the type of person who uses anger to get ahead, you’ll do terrible damage to your reputation. People will assume you’re someone who has no control over their emotions. This is likely to cost you friendships, goodwill and opportunities. Just to choose one example out of many, managers are unlikely to promote an employee who’s seen as having emotional issues.
Anger is a bad habit to have. If you’ve got it, make a commitment to get rid of it.
In both my personal experience, and what I’ve learned talking to other people, bouts of fury usually have warning signs. Rather than suddenly coming out of nowhere, most people admit they knew they were becoming angry before the explosion.
This type of sudden fury is like a fast growing tree. It starts as a small, but perceptible, acorn and if left unattended soon grows into a huge oak. Getting rid of an acorn is simple, you simply throw it away. Disposing of an oak is much more difficult.
So in order to control outbursts, you have to catch your anger when it’s still at the acorn level. If you feel yourself becoming irritable and impatient during a particular situation, that’s a good sign that an outburst is probably on the way. Once someone enters this stage on the anger scale, it usually doesn’t take much to push them over the edge.
If you start to feel touchy about something, make it your first priority to be rid of that feeling. Excuse yourself immediately from the situation, and go somewhere private to calm down. In some situations, such as meetings, this may be difficult. But the discomfort you’ll feel from excusing yourself will be nothing compared to the damage you may do if you don’t allow yourself to calm down.
Once you find somewhere private, try to relax yourself and put the irritation out of your mind. Concentrate on your breathing. Make it deep and steady rather than short and harsh.
Relax your hands and let the tension ease from your body. Close your eyes and picture a calming scene.
Purge the anger from your body while it's small, rather than letting it become huge and overwhelm you.
Once you've calmed down, return to the situation and deal with it rationally and without bad emotions coming into play. Your outcomes will likely be much better that way. Don't allow yourself to believe that outbursts come with benefits, because more often than not they don't.
Train yourself to become very sensitive to anger entering your mind and finding ways of getting yourself out of the situation to calm down.
Like everything, you’ll get better at this with practice. Be able to do this, and you’re likely to do less damage to your prospects through uncontrolled anger.
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