Anger Issues

Anger is the armour that we use to protect ourselves when we feel threatened by a given person or situation. In evolutionary terms it exists to help us to survive a real threat to our lives. When facing a threat we first try to flee. If we cannot flee, we fight back. If we cannot fight back, we freeze. Outside of survival, however, anger is an attempt to cope with perceived threats to our psyche, confidence, way of life, choices, wants or needs. Our anger can be loud and aggressive or it can be quiet and calculated. Either way, we use anger to control the situation or people around us through intimidation, aggression, rejection, judgement, manipulation or coercion.

While it might not seem like it, anger is actually an attempt to cope with our underlying fear and pain by controlling those around us. Despite our best intentions to self-protect, however, anger often ends up becoming a problem in itself. We often say hurtful things we don’t mean and act in ways that get us into trouble which impacts our personal and professional relationships. We can all too easily become over-reactive and hypersensitive to situations that do not work in our favour. As a result we often develop a sense of shame about our actions and a lacking sense of resilience and this can then effect our self-confidence.

We are able to work on our anger by exploring the origins of where it comes from and identifying the hurt, pain and fear that lies underneath. In time, we begin to see that we have choice when we feel threatened and that we can choose to respond rather than react and this allows us to still self-protect in healthier ways.