Anger in the Age of Entitlement

Cleaning up emotional pollution.

Steven Stosny, Ph.D., treats people for anger and relationship problems. Recent books: How to Improve your Marriage without Talking about It, and Love Without Hurt. See full bio

January 2, 2009, Anxiety

Comments on "Anger Problems: Prevention"

Anger Problems: Prevention

By Steven Stosny on January 2, 2009 in Anger in the Age of Entitlement

One dangerous myth about an "anger problem" is that it only involves aggression, abuse, hurting people, or destroying property. Such behaviors are merely the extreme end of the anger spectrum, indicating but one of many kinds of anger problems.

Though we associate extreme behaviors with anger, in reality most of the anger we experience in the course of our lives is unconscious.

how to prevent it

Submitted by leau on January 3, 2009 - 4:42am.

How to prevent anger may be a mission impossible,I believe that it will be the greatest skill in human history if someone invent a technic to fix the problem.
"The best way to prevent anger problems is to control subtle forms of anger by building more compassion and value into your life."I hope you explain it more specifically.

Anger PROBLEMS can be prevented

Submitted by Steven Stosny on January 3, 2009 - 10:03am.

The article is not about preventing anger. That would neither be possible nor desirable. It is about preventing anger problems, which is a chronic form that either makes you act against your best interests or keeps you from acting in your best interests. Anger keeps you a state where you feel devalued and have the urge to devalue others. Building more value in your life makes it more difficult to stay in that state for long. Everything you are angry about you can also be compassionate about, in recognition of the human frailty we all share. Compassion does not condone bad or unfair behavior; it merely humanizes the offender. When you humanize the offender, you feel more humane and, therefore, more valuable. When you demonize the offender, as people with anger problems do, you feel less humane and need more anger to protect more vulnerability.

nice article, thanks for the

Submitted by farouk on January 3, 2009 - 6:22am.

nice article, thanks for the info

The problems

Submitted by leau on January 5, 2009 - 12:33am.

Thanks.I get your point.
Can I compared anger to a bomb,your provention skill is how to reduce the damages when it explodes?I believe the provention is a big project,which will seem direct us to the questions of phylosophy rather than psychology.
I will be reading your posts.

No accumulation of explosive material

Submitted by Steven Stosny on January 5, 2009 - 7:30am.

Prevention has to do with processing negative emotions before they accumulate to anything like an explosive level. The psychology is following the motivation of the emotions anger is trying to protect you from, mostly guilt, shame, and fear. These emotions lead you to your deepest values, from which you do not need defense. Fidelity to your deeper values prevents anger problems, though not, of course, the experience of anger.

There is a quasi philosophical issue of what kind of person want to be, angry or compassionate. But your "philosophical" choice has serious psychological and health consequences for you and those who interact with you.

Anger

Submitted by George Durbin on January 15, 2009 - 6:19pm.

Is there a treatment center that would be good to good to to get help.

Sorry for the delay in

Submitted by Steven Stosny on June 1, 2009 - 9:08am.

Sorry for the delay in responding, I just saw this. There is a lot of material on http://compassionpower.com. Especially the boot camps.

I agree with having value in

Submitted by sammmy on May 31, 2009 - 10:36am.

I agree with having value in your life makes you feel more compassionate about dealing with the day to day ups and downs. However I have a son that is 20 and he has no job & his girlfriend is pregant he flys off the handle and destroys things makes his girlfirned cry, BUT he does not think he has a problem. Today he flew off the handle and said he was going to kill himself that we his dad, mom and girlfriend make him loose it. How do I get him to see that he has the problem and to get help, I have tryed to make appts. but hes says he is fine and will not go.

See this article on

Submitted by Steven Stosny on June 1, 2009 - 9:11am.

See this article on compassionate assertiveness:

http://compassionpower.com/gethimtobootcamp.php

The article concerns getting a spouse into treatment, but the strategy is the same for a son.

What you describe (Sammy)

Submitted by HerbMD on June 9, 2009 - 11:56pm.

What you describe (Sammy) sounds more like rage than just anger. I believe there is a great deal of difference between anger and rage.

What I have come to believe is that anger is more like a stop sign. It lets us know that our boundaries have been violated. Rage is more like a ticking time bomb ready to explode at the slightest provocation.

Many times when we experience rage we may have unresolved shame and fear issues which we have buried and no longer think about, but react to quite readily. Rage can be very frightening to partners, parents, children and co-workers as raging people look scary and out of control.

Anger can be useful alerting us to areas where we may have boundary issues of our own. Rage generally points to the past.

Good luck with your son. I would encourage you to follow Dr. Stosny's advice if possible.

Whether he is willing to try that method or not, you might want to try a 12 step program like CoDA (Co-dependents anonymous) for your son's girlfriend, yourself and your wife.

Here is the URL to find a meeting http://www.codependents.org/. They are generally free and most probably have a location near your home. The steps work if you work them.

Good luck!!