Published on 12, July, 2020
HI all,
From my perspective, I have found that anger is the most challenging emotion to feel/express effectively and accept in others. I realise anger is an important emotion which is useful in many scenarios but my personal observation is that others sometimes use it to undermine/attack/bully others. This for me is when it becomes unacceptable and traumatising. When I feel anger building in me and I know that I cannot stop it, I am terrified inside as it feels overwhelming for me. I am more comfortable with other emotions but am learning that it is okay to be angry as long as you remain respectful and if you can't you escape the situation or warn the other person the level of anger you are feeling so you can talk later when calmer. I'd like to know of other strategies people use to allow anger to happen and be okay with it. I rarely express anger towards others because it's so built up from years of repression that I would be scared of how it would manifest. I am so used to pushing it down that I now no longer feel it even if another person is fully expressing it right in my face. I tend to disassociate and feel sad about whatever it is that got them to that point of hurt. I see anger as the protective barrier for hurt and trauma.
Thanks for reading, I look forward to gaining more insight into this emotion.
Interesting post. My emotions are very suppressed; occasionally, I feel really intense anger, but it tends to go away almost instantly. In the past, I've controlled this by harming myself; I suspect a better solution is to come up with some way to deal with the problems caused by long-term masking and disassociation. However, I don't know what that is at the moment.
In answer to 1, 3, 4, 5, and 6, I don't think anger is inherently wrong. In fact, I would suggest there is a moral dimension to most emotions; it is good to feel anger when seeing someone being harmed, for example. Conversely, it is not necessarily a virtue to be placid in the face of wrongdoing. For me at least, suppression is part of masking, and I think I would be better off doing less of it.
Regards 4, I think suppressing emotions, including anger, makes me less able to defend myself, Both expressing anger unreasonably, or not expressing it at all, are both undesirable.
Regards 2, I'm very rational, so if someone is angry at me for something that makes no sense, I sometimes can't help laughing. I don't have much of a sense of danger, so if someone is just incoherently shouting at me, they could do it all day without making a difference. I would be very upset if a person was angry because I'd hurt them in some way though.
DiffidAnt said:Interesting post.
Thanks for sharing DA,
I also have a tendency to laugh not when someone is angry but usually if they've gotten a fright. It usually ends on a positive note but it's so difficult to contain as I find these things hilarious.
I agree that expressing anger "unreasonably" is "undesirable" for all parties involved but sometimes it's unavoidable. If this ever happens to me, which is rare, I apologise and take steps to make up for my behaviour.
I'm also rational which makes it hard for me to understand why someone would act in a passive aggressive way because it makes no sense to me. If I feel someone is acting angrily towards me, I'll ask them directly if I have done something to offend them in order that we can talk about it. If their behaviour is causing me to fell angry then I will take a moment to calm down and think how they might be feeling before I confront them directly.
I understand what you mean about the "self harm." I stopped the physical self harm but I tend to self sabotage by pushing possible partners/friends away. I recognise when I am doing this but it's not always a bad thing because it sorts the wheat from the chaff. :-)