9 steps to healing chronic anger
Suppressed anger can often manifest as a constant low-grade frustration or nervousness that neither depends on external causes nor gets better when circumstances seem to be fine. Occasionally it erupts into a full-blown rage or an act of aggression. Paradoxically, the more we fight against our anger, the more miserable we get. That’s because the struggle against difficult emotions is essentially a war against ourselves. To soften emotional pain, we may then need to just embrace our anger and cultivate compassion towards the wounded self.
I was angry for almost two decades of my life but I couldn’t see it. I called myself sensitive, impatient, strong-willed. I thought I was rightfully reacting to other people’s wrongdoings. I thought I just wasn’t flexible enough to tolerate my principles being broken. I was offering myself all kinds of explanations for my constant frustration. It became natural to be unhappy and unnatural to be happy. It wasn’t until the unhappiness grew into depression, that I allowed myself to listen to what my anger was trying to tell me. Today I share nine steps that could help you understand your anger at a deeper level and transform it in a positive manner.
Step 1: Recognizing the manifestations of anger
Most of us don’t realize the numerous expressions that anger can have, especially its subtler forms. Here is an indicative list;
Anger turned outwards:
Indignation, maliciousness, revenge, rage, belligerence, envy, hatred, abusiveness, resentment, frustration, irony, cynicism, contempt, stubbornness, impatience, irritability, harshness, grumpiness, sulkiness, stonewalling, detachment, punitiveness.
Anger turned inwards:
Unworthiness, self-punishment, depression.
Step 2: Accessing the embodied emotion
We often cannot express our exact emotions verbally and even if we do, words are not enough to define the vastness of the experience. If you want to start allowing anger to reveal its true essence to you, you could try to access how you sense it in your body. The next time you feel angry, close your eyes and start paying attention to your breathing. Scan your body for feelings of heaviness, tension or pain. Quit trying to define the feeling mentally; your mind may come up with questions like “why do I feel this?”, or “how will it go away?”. Do not get involved in your mind’s chatter. Just observe your body and the unpleasant sensations that exist within it. Anger often sits in our stomach and heart area. You may feel it inside your head as tightening or at the back of your neck. It might occupy your whole body as tense muscles or be a knot in your throat. Everyone experiences it differently and the purpose of this exercise is to understand how your anger manifests in your body so you are able to recognize it when it arises.
If you wish to go a step further, observe how you resist the experience of being angry. Then decide to stop resisting and just allow. Allow the tightness in the chest to be there without fighting it. Breathe into it and be a mere witness to the unfolding of your bodily sensations. You may notice that the emotion subsides or that it’s not that intense anymore.
Step 3: Dig deeper
Anger is a response to pain. I have seen it many times having this function. We get hurt, treated unfairly, insulted, neglected, abused, disrespected. We feel unloved, unseen, judged. Instead of passive submission to pain, we choose an emotion of active energy, although this is rarely a conscious choice. When we are angry, we don’t want to justify the harm done to us. We want to let the flames burn because their fire is powerful. Anger is an attempt to conquer pain and prevent further hurt.
Think about this; If the function of anger was to protect you, what would it be protecting you from? What are you not willing to feel?
Step 4: Let your anger talk to you
When I first discovered this Psychosynthesis exercise, I felt a deep sense of relief. Its purpose is to have us identify our various subpersonalities or in other words, the “people” we have inside us. Subpersonalities are different personality modes that arise so we can deal with certain situations. Each one of us has many different subpersonalities, the “nice” and the “mean”, the “fearless” and the “timid”, the “traditional” and the “rebel”. We are not just one thing. We are both dark and bright, good and bad, ordinary and strange. Self-actualization is the process of harmonizing these energies and becoming whole. In this exercise, we visualize anger in human form. We think of it as a separate entity that exists within us. The purpose is to let suppressed feelings, thoughts and memories emerge without trying to silence them. We listen to our emotions and let them disclose their message. We invite the “angry” self to show its face.
Close your eyes and focus on your angry feelings. Imagine that your anger has taken human form. How does it look like? Is it be a man or a woman? Young or old? What clothes is your humanized Anger wearing? Describe their face, their voice, their body. Do they remind you of someone you know? What qualities do they have? If you could give them a descriptive name, such as “the old grumpy bastard” or “the witch”, what would their name be? Imagine you initiate a conversation with them. You want to know why they are in your life, their message for you. Let them talk to you and observe any feeling that arises from your interaction.
You may keep notes and revisit them at a later stage. Once you get to know your anger, you will realize that it is only a part of you that was born to serve a certain purpose. You are not your Anger. You contain so many more subpersonalities and none is your exclusive identity.
Step 5: Let go of expectations
Unfulfilled expectations can cause disappointment and anger. At the heart of every expectation is the emotion of desire. We want to experience love. We want to get respect and acknowledgement by other people. We want to enjoy life and get what we deserve. In other words, we want things to unfold in a way that makes us happy. However, the happiness that is based on fulfilling our expectations is very fragile. That’s because we cannot control how life happens to us, and we cannot control other people. Additionally, human nature is wired to attach to desire. Once we fulfil an expectation, then another one will pop up.
Letting go of expectations means that we are no longer bound by our desire to have things happening in a certain way. It means allowing life to flow and accepting that we won’t always get what we want.
We can still have a preference or a goal, but we assign less importance to the outcome. We expand our thinking to consider alternatives. We allow people around us to be themselves without the direct or indirect pressure of our expectations. We may notice that this simple shift changes their attitude towards us. Non-attachment to a specific outcome is liberating. We stop struggling, and instead, we drift in the river of life.
Step 6: Practise true compassion towards yourself
We are rarely willing to make friends with the vulnerable self. We just want to get rid of this shameful side of ours. We replace our hurt with anger because anger gives us the illusion of strength. Our vulnerable self must stay hidden at any cost, and so we push her away with great hostility; this way, the suffering doubles and establishes its presence for good.
The antidote to anger is compassion. Compassion is the rain that saves the burning forest of our soul. It is an element of true love, the kind that doesn’t impose any rules, conditions or expectations. First, we must practice compassion toward our self. If we do not manage to experience self-compassion, we cannot offer it to others.
Practising self-compassion was extremely difficult for me. My first reaction was always to find what I have done wrong. I was offering myself the same kind of judgemental attitude that has been given to me by my parents. I do not blame them as they have also grown up with a total lack of emotional support from their parents. But we can cultivate self-compassion and redeem ourselves from our own judgements.
Self-compassion entails self-respect, self-love and self-care. Once you are compassionate toward yourself, you will be able to set healthy boundaries and forgive others without the risk of losing yourself. If you forgive before you have self-compassion, you might not respect your suffering, and others might not respect it either.
Exercise to cultivate compassion towards the self
Return to the memory of ideal, unconditional love, as it has been given to you before. It can be love in any form and time in your life. Go back as far as you need to. Let yourself remember being loved, even if it was for a short moment or just by one person. Inhale the warmth of this love, let it flood your heart and let it flow through your whole body. Exhale any anger you may feel, any disappointment or shame. Let your exhalation liberate all your pain. You can make this exhalation as loud as you want, you can make it forceful or gentle; there is no right and wrong. At every in-breath, you inhale pure love and send it to yourself. At every out-breath, you exhale your suffering.
Once we have experienced compassion for ourselves, then we can offer it to others. We can start understanding that human suffering is universal and that we are not the only ones in pain. As Thich Nhat Hanh says “When you look deeply into your anger, you will see that the person you call your enemy is also suffering. As soon as you see that, the capacity of accepting and having compassion for them is there.”
Step 7: Forgive
Forgiveness is a liberating choice we make. Contrary to what we think, forgiveness is not a one-off action. It is a new mindset we have to cultivate and a new way of being. I practice forgiveness every day. I ask myself to let go of expectations and stop attaching to past hurts. It is not easy. One of the days I wrote the following lines in my journal.
“I choose to forgive; I choose to leave in peace. I understand that we are all in pain-just different forms. You hurt as I hurt and you suffer as I suffer. You often don’t know about my pain, and I don’t know about yours. I wish my heart to be at peace that is why I release you.”
When you feel ready, you can practice a different inhalation-exhalation exercise. On every in-breath, take in all of humanity’s suffering. Then exhale true compassion. This meditation is based on the Buddhist practice of Tonglen, which aims to cultivate deep compassion by reversing the human tendency of avoiding pain and seeking pleasure.
Step 8: Let go of attachments and trust the flow of life
As I mentioned above, anger is about the illusion of control and an inner rebellion towards “weakness”. You do not want to let go of your anger because you believe that it’s justified. The belief that anger is somewhat helpful signifies that you have built a positive attachment towards your anger.
Similarly, you might have built a negative attachment towards your anger. You might hate how it ruins your life and how you feel guilty or ashamed after an outburst. You try to control it, but it seems to be beyond you. Being angry evokes a range of other difficult emotions, and you are trapped in a never-ending vicious circle.
To surrender, we must trust. Trust that without anger, we will be freer and happier. Trust that even if things don’t happen our way, we gain nothing by pushing against them. Non-acceptance only perpetuates our suffering. Our “why” grows stronger, and so does our despair. We cannot force anyone to behave the way we think we deserve. We cannot make life unfold in the way we think it’s best for us.
Step 9: Surrender your anger
To surrender your anger, stop struggling against it. Feel how it manifests in your body. Accept its presence and embrace what it signifies. Give thanks to your anger for playing a protective role in your life. See it neither as good nor bad, but as what it really is: an aspect of your inner world. Go back to the hurt inside you. Don’t turn away; take a good look.
Reflect on the most important question. If I wasn’t angry, how would I feel?
Practice the willingness to embrace the emotions behind your anger. Practice the willingness to love your broken side and be vulnerable. Ask for forgiveness from those you hurt with your anger. Allow yourself to let it go. Remember that compassion heals, so aim to practice compassion meditation as often as you can.
Note: I am still practising forgiveness, compassion and letting go of expectations. Although I don’t manage every day, I no longer feel bound by angry feelings. I follow the process and believe it will work out for me.
