Even after more than 20 years of practice in the area of chronic resentment, anger, and abuse, it continues to amaze and dismay me how many calls and emails I get about anger problems during the holidays. We all know the reasons - families are together more, overeating and overdrinking, offering more opportunity for conflict. The expectation of happiness around the holidays inclines them to frustration and to blaming their disappointment on those around them.
Anger provides a way to temporarily numb or avoid pain, which is why, when you bang your thumb hanging a picture, you don't pray. Most of us are unaware of our hurt when angry.
Most problem anger - that which makes you act against your best interest - is about abrupt ego pain or threat of ego pain. Something happens that makes you feel devalued, disregarded, put down, disrespected, or unfairly/inappropriately treated. In other words, most anger is about temporary loss of personal value. When we feel a sudden loss of value, we feel vulnerable and less energetic.
Anger mobilizes the organism with instant energy, pain-relief, and confidence, preparing you to protect vulnerability by exerting power over someone else, either in your head or in their face. You'll think, "What a jerk, or what a cold, inconsiderate person," or you'll actually say it, usually with sarcasm.
The problem is that anger substitutes power for value. Anger will never make you feel more valuable, though it will temporarily make you feel more powerful, provided the person you are angry at submits and does what you want. This is unlikely, because he/she will feel devalued by your anger and want you to submit in retaliation. If you violate your own values when you are angry, which we often do, you will need to stay angry - usually in the form of resentment - to ward off the guilt. When the anger goes, self-doubt returns.
Looking out for the Angry
Personality characteristics most likely to cause anger problems:
- Large egos: They have a sense of entitlement; the world will not meet their entitlement needs, once they're over five and not cute anymore.
- Superiority complex: Their self-value rises on the backs of others, which requires continual arousal to sustain.
- Externally regulated self-value (has to come from others): Personal value is regulated by what you do (namely being true to your deeper values), not by what other people do.
- Anxiety levels that make them want to control their environments: the environment will have its own agenda.
- Those with a low tolerance for ambiguity: Anger makes things black and white.
There is a general principle in dealing with others who are angry: When people feel valued they cooperate; when they feel devalued, they either resist or submit with resentment and hidden hostility. Show value and respect, and you are likely to get them returned. Devalue or coerce and you are much more likely to get them returned.
Forget "Justified," Think, "Useful" and "Authentic"
It is never a question of whether your anger is "justified" or "appropriate." The important question is this: "Does my anger or resentment lead me to act according to my deeper values, i.e., is it the real me, or a reaction to someone else?" If you react to a jerk like a jerk, what does that make you?
The second and third important questions are: "Is my anger or resentment working to get me what I want? Are they making me the person I most want to be?"
Anger and resentment are more likely to make you self-righteous than right. When angry or resentful, you're wrong even when you're right:
- It is nearly impossible to understand other people's perspectives when you're angry or resentful. You never have a complete view of a negotiation, even when your part of it is factually right.
- Anger and resentment make you oversimplify and see only one negative aspect of something. Even if you are right in your appraisal of that negative aspect, you are oversimplifying when you're resentful or angry.
- Anger and resentment amplify and magnify only the negative aspect of something, which blows it out of proportion and takes it out of context.
- The person you're angry at will not see that you are right if he or she feels devalued by your anger or resentment.
It's easier to see these effects of anger and resentment when someone is angry at you and that person is right, you made a mistake. Your reaction is:
- "There's more to it, she's oversimplifying."
- "He's making too much of it."
- "She just can't see my perspective."
You feel reduced to that one mistake, as if all the good things you've ever done don't count.
If you are unhappy around the holidays, or any other time, do something that will make you feel more valuable, not more powerful. Have a Value New Year - feel more valuable by investing more value in those around you.
