Mapping Out Anger

In 2007 I fell in love for the first time. Fortunately, she fell too and we enjoyed our early college days together. Over 20 months in I got a phone call and our relationship, to me, abruptly ended. I cried everyday for months and was awash in hurt and, above all, confusion. Truthfully, that breakup has been one of the best things that has happened to me. Top three for sure. The breakup worked as a catalyst for personal change that has propelled me to today. Three months into being an absolute mess I got my head above water just enough to realize that if I didn’t learn from what happened and deliberately change then I was doomed to repeat this relationship’s downfall.

There have been many books, tools, articles, workshops, conversations, podcasts, and experiences that have helped me on my path of deliberate personal change. Today I’d like to share one that I learned early and haven’t seen anywhere else.

It comes from MindOs by Dr. Paul who I learned about from a column on askmen.com. This was the only worthwhile thing that I found from the site while lost and heartbroken. There is a lot of value in this book. What follows is a summary of one tiny part.

We are going to make a map for anger. Where it comes from. Where it leads. And where we want to go when we experience it.

Anger comes from one of two places. Either from a hurt when someone violates our personal boundary or from an internal need not being met. For instance a violation of personal space or a need to be heard and understood.

When we are passive with our anger and do nothing with it it goes into a pit and becomes sadness and depression. People are often told to stop being emotional when they experience anger. Anger without an outlet leads to sadness. The way out of anger involves doing something with that anger. Being angry is better than being sad because while we are angry we are closer to taking action on the thing that has hurt us. If we are sad then we need to acknowledge and activate our anger in order to process it instead of storing it up.

When we take action on our anger we do so either constructively or destructively.

To use anger in a destructive way is to be aggressive. Shouting, physical violence, putting others down. Aggression in this context is a win/lose dynamic. It often pairs with others who are taking this person's aggression and turning it into their own sadness. Aggression is always a quick fix attempt at solving anger.

To use anger in a constructive way is to be assertive. To get one’s needs met independent of others. To hold one’s own boundary without hurting others. Being assertive is win/win. Being assertive with our anger in the face of a boundary violation or an unmet need is the path out of anger and into well-being.

By understanding this map of anger I can find myself or others in sadness, anger or aggression and realize that this person is either hurt from something that violated their boundary or that they have a need that they are struggling to communicate. I can then ask myself or the other person what it is that they want or why do they feel hurt. If we can find the source of our hurt then we can begin to be assertive and champion our well-being.

To summarize this: - Anger comes from hurt or unmet needs.

- Anger used passively is sadness.

- Anger used destructively is aggression.

- Anger used constructively is assertiveness.

- Being assertive with our anger leads well-being.

As far as I can tell, there are four components to being assertive.

- You have to know what it is that you want.

- You have to know your boundaries.

- You have to be able to communicate both your wants and your boundaries.

- You have to have the courage to communicate.

In previous romantic relationships I would take my unmet needs for connection, or autonomy and shove them in the pit of sadness after internalizing that they wouldn’t be addressed. Exposing my sadness didn’t seem to help and turning my anger about this into aggression often made things worse. Instead of being assertive I would carry around a grapefruit sized weight in my solar plexus until the weight was too much to carry and the relationship would end. Had I known my needs and been more skilled at communicating them I would have had an easier time upholding my boundaries.

Lately I’ve been experiencing sadness at work from a long running unmet need for autonomy and stimulation. I was more passive than the situation called for to drive attention and change to my dissatisfaction. Eventually my frustration over my dissatisfaction simmered my sadness into anger. Acknowledging this has led to me being assertive about my problems during my one-on-ones with my boss. By journaling over my thoughts and feelings I have been able to articulate myself with my boss and instigate change for what I’m working on.

This framework has changed the way I see my parents. They can get aggressive with each other real fast. The overflow of their collective aggression spilled into my pit of sadness growing up. Now I can see their aggressive acts as attempts towards getting their needs met through a backlog of hurt that is deeper and richer than I can currently comprehend. Knowing that is there has changed the way I talk with both of them. It has disarmed the way that I have been triggered in responding to their anger by either becoming sad and small or aggressive and short-sighted. I don’t take their actions literally and instead attempt to see past the actions for what lies beneath them.

You can follow the framework here and combine it with journaling to find the hurt that’s violated your boundary and the wants associated with your unmet needs.

There are many books about communication. Those two are both excellent and Non-Violent Communication is probably the best one for this topic from the ones I have read.

As for cultivating courage, come back next week.