Anger Solutions: How Anger Develops

This post is excerpted from Julie Christiansen's book, Anger Solutions: Proven Strategies for Effectively Resolving Anger and Taking Control of Your Emotions.

“Two ways to fail: Think without acting, Act without thinking”

How do we get this thing called anger in the first place? Isn’t that the question? Understanding how anger develops is instrumental in developing safe, appropriate and effective ways of expressing it.

Let’s look first at some of the common causes or triggers of anger. You are probably thinking, “I already know what my triggers are! It’s those crazy drivers, those irritating salespeople, my boss, my whining kids…” Although we tend to think that the visible or audible stimuli in our environment are the causes or triggers for our anger, the truth lies more in the fact that those stimuli cause us to feel an emotion. The emotion that is induced by the stimulus is the actual trigger.

Some of the most common causes of anger are felt emotions such as confusion, frustration and threat. Let’s take a quick look at how these words really contribute to the context of anger resolution and management.

 Confusion

• Over-stimulation or sensory overload. This might take the form of too much noise, too much traffic, too many people talking at once with the stereo blasting and the phone ringing, etc.
• Lack of oxygen to the brain. (Poor breathing techniques can contribute to this. We will discuss the value of good breathing later on.)
• Misperception of verbal communication due to poor filtering.
• Misperception of physical communication due to poor filtering.
• Misinterpretation of verbal and/or physical communication due to cognitive deficit (developmental delay, brain injury).

Frustration

Consider this example of how frustration translates into anger.

I want my voice to be heard. I feel like no one is listening. My desire is not being fulfilled therefore I feel frustrated. I want to attract attention, but no one is noticing. I feel more frustrated... My frustration goes unanswered… I feel anger...

I once had a dream that clearly reinforces this concept. In my dream, I was desperately trying to dial 911 to report a severe beating of a woman outside my house. The first difficulty was that I had no dial tone due to someone else being connected to my line. I could not convince this person to hang up so I could connect with 911, nor could I communicate effectively how dire the need was that we get an ambulance. In the background, the noise level was mounting.

Since I could not convince the other party to get off my line, I asked them to get hold of 911 services for me. They agreed, but when I had finally completed giving them instructions to my house and I asked them if they had received all the information, there was no one there! As you can imagine my level of panic and frustration was mounting steadily as was the volume of noise in the background. Finally, in my dream, my state of anxiety continued to increase until I “blasted”, and what a blast it was! Needless to say, I awoke with a start and had a bit of trouble getting back to sleep afterward.

The process of mounting frustration and panic that took place in my dream is typical of what happens in our everyday lives, although not necessarily in that intensity. “Frustration” happens when your desired goals appear to be unattainable. Anger happens when “frustration” begins to build into an emotional crescendo.

 

Expectations

 

The most important factor that I believe contributes to the escalation of anger is this: EXPECTATIONS. According to William Glasser, the author of Choice Theory, we all filter the stimuli we receive in the "real" world through our senses, our values, and our expectations. This filtered information is the "perceived" world. We tend to think of our perceptions as reality - the way things truly are; however, we must remember that our perceptions are coloured or impacted by our personal filters. This is why two people can see the same movie, witness the same accident, or look at the same beautiful person and have different reactions, thoughts, or ideas about what they saw.

 

Now, the problem lies here: in addition to our perceived reality, we also have an IDEAL world - our expectation of how things "should" be. For example, your kids should clean up their room, your husband should be considerate, the wife should always have dinner on the table, your boss should respect your intelligence and ability... but often our perceived world doesn't match up to our ideal world. When there is enough of a discrepancy between what we WANT and what we think we HAVE, anger can develop. It may begin with disappointment, frustration, or irritation, but the more unhappy we are with our perceived world, the easier it will be to respond in anger.

 

Often when we receive that FRUSTRATION signal to the brain, we revert to whatever comes naturally for us. One typical approach is to ACT without THINKING - this is to externalize our feelings through acting out behaviours - yelling, physical actions, slamming doors, threatening, throwing things, driving too fast, etc. The other option is to THINK without ACTING - this is to internalize feelings, hiding them from the world and using self-blame or perhaps other-blame in a very personal quiet way, while never actually talking about or doing something about those feelings. Either way, this creates a sense of imbalance. The only way to achieve balance is through a process of self-evaluation, which I have discussed often in this blog:

 

T: Think - what is happening? what does it mean? how do I feel about it? what should I do about my feelings? what is the best thing that can  happen if I do this? what is the worst thing that can happen if I do this?

 

S: Say - Talk to the person with whom you have the problem, or the one who can help you resolve it. Use assertive language - I feel ... because...

 

A: Ask - Invite the other party to engage in a dialogue with you to work at resolving the issue that is presenting itself. See if you can work together to achieve an outcome that is desirable for you both.

 

Remember that you cannot and must not ask for some input then walk away once the person starts to talk!  If you start the dialogue, see it through.  Remember that if you expect people to hear you out, you must extend the same courtesy to them.  So hear them out, and if you disagree, then so be it!  At least you are talking about it now, and even if all that comes of the dialogue is that you agree to disagree, you will still have come a long way from feeling hurt or angry.

 

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Anger Solutions: Belief is the Basis of Action

(This blog entry is excerpted from Julie Christiansen's book, Anger Solutions: Proven Strategies for Effectively Resolving Anger. To purchase your copy, please visit: www.angersolution.com).

 

Anger Solutions: Belief is the Basis of Action

There are many common misconceptions about anger: what it is, what it isn’t; how it works, why it works; what it’s for, and how to express it.  Anger is one of those great emotional paradoxes. 

We as human beings experience anger on a regular basis, but unlike happiness, sadness and fear, we struggle with its expression.  When we’re happy we laugh.  When we’re sad we cry.  When we’re afraid, we tremble, run, fight, or hide.  But when we’re angry, we somehow get stuck.  Somehow, throughout the course of time, we have come to believe that anger is too volatile, too dangerous, too violent an emotion.

I suppose if you look at the history of mankind, from Cain to Judas to Jack the Ripper to Hitler, the examples we have for coping with anger haven’t left us much we can, in good conscience, use.  However there are two sides to every story, and two ways to learn from history. When I think of Joseph, Jesus, Churchill, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, or Martin Luther King, I see another side of anger.  I see that anger is different things to different people. What sets one group apart from the other is a little thing called belief.

Belief is at the root of everything we do. To borrow from the title of Dr. Wayne Dyer’s books, “you’ll see it when you believe it.”  This is not some hokey, “psychobabblish” notion that is all about “mind over matter”.  It is a simple truth; one that has existed since the dawn of time yet has been widely ignored or discounted by the populous at large.

When we get up in the morning, swing our legs over the side of our beds, and plant our feet firmly on the floor, we are doing so based on a belief (that the floor is still where it was when we went to bed the night before).  If we truly believed that while we were sleeping the floor had dissolved and turned into Jello, would we be so quick to jump out of bed? I don’t think so.

If you stop to think about it, everything we do in the course of a day is based on certain beliefs we hold to be true.  Many of those beliefs are so deeply ingrained that we cannot even consciously acknowledge their existence.  If asked to articulate what belief allows us to drive our cars without fear every day; what belief enables us to perform the daily duties of our jobs, or to nurture positive trusting relationships with some people but not others, chances are the majority of us would not be able to articulate them.

The journey of life can and will be virtually impossible to navigate if we fail to use our built-in guidance systems. The most powerful of those is our personal belief system.  Beliefs have the power to shape us, to make us, and to break us.  Depending on what you choose to believe in, you may be an incredibly strong individual, with the ability to take on new challenges, to learn new things, to take risks, and to effectively deal with the consequences of your actions.  Your choices regarding your beliefs may also transform you into a weak, dependent person; one who is afraid to try, afraid to fail, afraid to succeed, and afraid to take responsibility for your own behaviour.  What you believe about anger is directly correlated to how you respond to situations that cause anger.  If in angry situations, you find yourself withdrawing, blaming, aggressing, or retreating, perhaps the beliefs you have held to be true are limiting you and shaping you into a person you do not wish to become.

Not long ago, I was talking with a client about his particular limiting beliefs. I remember sharing with him the notion that belief is the basis of action, and watching as revelation dawned in his facial expression.  He wrote it down in his notebook in large, bold letters, and repeated the phrase a few times to himself, “Belief is the basis of action.”  To paraphrase his response, he said to me, “Already, my outlook on life is changing, just by hearing that one statement.  I’ve been paralyzed, and afraid to act; but, if I truly believe that I have something to offer the world, if I truly believe that I am talented, if I truly believe that I am capable, taking steps toward my goals is so much easier! This has been the missing link for me.  I wonder why I didn’t see it before. ”
There is nothing wrong with challenging your beliefs; that is, as long as you are doing so in a systematic and open way.  Often people will challenge their foundational beliefs by espousing the exact opposite of the principles they have always lived by.

• A woman who has remained passive in an abusive relationship one day comes to the realization that she enables her abuser by being passive.  She swings to the other side of the pendulum and kills her abusive spouse in his sleep.
• A mother that traditionally vents her anger by crying in the bathroom decides that this technique is no longer useful for her. She begins yelling at her children.
• Children that have striven for perfection in order to be accepted, decide to rebel. They slack off in school, listen to dark, depressing music and begin using drugs.
• A quiet, non-confrontational, community-minded storeowner shoots the robber of his store with a shotgun after being robbed five times.

You see, just because you realize that the thing you have always believed is wrong doesn’t make your next choice of belief or action right.  Often what is required is not a dramatic 180-degree turn, but rather a slight shift of attitudes, beliefs, and actions.

 

Anger Solutions provides you with the tools you need to make those subtle shifts, and to challenge your beliefs openly and systematically.  The tools contained in this little toolkit will enable you to picture anger for what it really is. They will help you to examine your belief systems and to understand both the positive and negative ramifications of holding on to those beliefs.  You will gain an increased awareness of your own responses to anger, and insight into the responses of those around you.  Anger Solutions will show you how to free yourself from the bondage that anger puts you in, and how to make anger work for you instead.

 

Christiansen, J. (2003). Anger Solutions: Proven Strategies for Effectively Resolving Anger and Taking Control of Your Emotions. St. Catharines: Leverage U Press.  (Trade Paperback, 225 pages, $24.95 +GST, Shipping and Handling). Available at: www.angersolution.com

Anger Solutions: Pain vs. Pleasure (repost)

People are always asking, "What makes Anger Solutions so much more effective than traditional anger management?" This is no simple question - as there are many facets of Anger Solutions that come together to make it an exceptional program. Today I want to share with you one of our great leveraging tools that help to contribute to our continued success. You heard about this a little from a previous posting in which I shared the story of Trey, and how I used pain as leverage to move him towards where he wanted to be.

This leveraging tool first conceptualized by Sigmund Freud is called, "The Pain/Pleasure Principle". It simply states that: Human beings will do more to avoid pain than they will to obtain pleasure.

Think about that for a minute: Human beings will do more to avoid pain than they will to obtain pleasure.
Ain't that the truth! Women will endure a great deal of abuse before they opt to leave a relationship. Employees will often put up with harrassment, put-downs, poor leadership, and all sorts of workplace challenges before they decide to leave a job. People will put up with all sorts of misbehaviour from loud, rowdy neighbours before they decide to call the police, start community action, or move to a quieter street. We have known this for years... that we must be highly frustrated or dissatisfied with a situation before we will attempt to make a change.

Why is this? Perhaps because there is safety in what we know. You've heard that old statement: "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't..." There is also a certain fear that is associated with changing - perhaps we will make the mistake of going from the frying pan into the fire.

This is also true when it comes to making behavioural change. It is so easy to do what we've always done - especially when there is some benefit in our current choice of action. Even if your present anger style is causing you pain, if you get the least amount of payoff from it, you will likely continue to use your old style because it is less painful than the perceived pain of trying to create change. We do this all the time - choose what we perceive to be the "lesser pain" rather than opting for what will bring us the "greater pleasure" in the long run.

Here's an example: Jon Smith is angry at his wife. He doesn't know how to talk to her without hurting her feelings, so he hides his anger by going out to the bars after work. This is causing him pain as well - because he is in effect alienating his wife and creating more distance between them. However, the perceived pain of confrontation is too much for him to handle so he avoids it by choosing the "lesser pain" of retreating to the bars. Jon's problem is that he has not considered the "greater pleasure" of what might happen if he sits down with his wife and has that difficult conversation. He is too afraid of the immediate discomfort and cannot see past that to how his relationship with his wife might be better if they just talk it out.

Anger Solutions challenges this way of thinking and encourages people to address the pain/pleasure principle on a conscious level. This proves to be an incredible leveraging tool - try it for yourself!

How would you apply the principle of pleasure and pain to the following situations?

1. Quitting smoking

2. Foolish binge spending

3. Losing you temper at work

Here's a Hint:

List the perceived benefits of each behaviour (or the "lesser pain") and remember what William Glasser says: "People do what makes sense to them..." If there is even a little benefit in the behaviour although it is painful, people will continue to do it.List the downside - what is truly painful about this behaviour (the "greater pain")?

Identify why it doesn't make sense. The key here is to emphasize the painful aspects or consequences of the behaviour...

Ask yourself: If by changing my behaviour, I could achieve the same or better feeling of pleasure without experiencing so much pain, would I change?

Visit our website at www.angersolution.com to purchase Julie's book, Anger Solutions: Proven Strategies for Effectively Resolving Anger!