I just recently read an article in a newspaper about anger management and it contained every detail from what is anger? The body mechanism during anger? How to control it the exercises practice etc…. How ever I was surprised when none of this thing concentrated on Why anger is build up at the first place??
None of us know why and when we would get angry and so angry that we completely lose control over ourselves. I kept thinking and thinking about it for long I mean there are no similarities in the situation when we get angry, no similarities on the person we get angry, no apparent particular reason why we get angry it could be as small as your child not eating his food to as big as somebody cheating you. Its daily its been on run everyday. Even then never have we been able to understand Why and how this anger builds up? What exact mechanism is responsible for this anger?
Difference:
I might not be a preacher but a mere observer hence I put forward a view of what I feel.
Have you ever noted that in every topic or in every situation there is always someone who is in Favor of the topic and one who is Against that topic, the number of people in support or defiance may be different but even then there will be few people on both sides. And why does that happen? Because apparently people of both sides have a few reasons to prove their sides CORRECT. The truth is also the same. There is never a side which is completely bad or completely good. What might be favorable to me might go against your beliefs. In short in what ever topic you begin to talk about YOU WILL FIND CERTAIN AMOUNT OF RESISTANCE.
Control:
Now we tend to trust ourselves too much “We know How to correct the world” we want to change everything outside to make ourselves feel good be it the roads the government makes, be it the food my wife cooks, be it the grades my kids get , even solving controversies like sania shoaib apparently with whom I have no connection. I just want these things the way I want “that makes me feel good and satisfied”. It’s not particularly about anything rather everything that we dislike we want them to change from people to things “THE WHOLE WORLD must do WHAT I WANT”. This predefined notion of “TRYING TO CHANGE AND CONTROL things and people like we want” causes us to get angry. Be it at office, home, school, college or neighborhood you would definitely find someone who’s always cribbing worrying about everything and we all hate that person don’t we??
Why?? It’s a simple thing. We all have our ideas about a particular happy life and we never want to do “what others want us to do”. Then how can we expect every living and non-living being to do what I want. Living beings won’t change their nature & non living can’t change their nature.
Lets see your day:
Action | Feeling | Reason |
You get up late in the morning your wife didn’t wake you up. Have an important deadline to cover. | You feel frustrated and angry on your wife for getting late. Curse the office for being so early. (even if its at 11). Feel burdened to drop kids to school. | Willing to control others and situation. |
You hit the shower in hurry and get ready and rush to work and face heavy traffic. | Your mood is already foul plus you curse the traffic, the government, migrating people, population etc. | Willing to control non living external factors. |
Reach work, the day gets worse you slog even more apparently the Boss seems in no good mood. | You get angry as nothing seems to be in order. You wish the boss could change, the deadline for work be a little extended or you could completely get a change in job with a better salary. | Again willing to change other people and situation. |
You get back home. No more energy to continue. Your wife and kids may put up problems for you to solve. | You feel like nobody in this house is responsible. Feel burdened to do everything alone. Scream and get angry on family. | Wanting external factors and people to agree to your will. |
Though this is just an example it might be different in different cases. In each of these situations one thing that is common is the idea of wanting everything external other than ourselves to change to adjust to what I feel is correct. And WE ALL KNOW EVERYTHING IN WORLD WILL NEVER AGREE TO WHAT I SAY. There will always be someone differing us. At this WE GET ANGRY. We do not waste a second to think that our expectations of everything perfect can never come true. But we easily say “No one can be perfect, so I’m not perfect either”. J
Irritation and Frustration:
These are big words. Big words of dictionary whose mere pronunciation draws us into a stressful situation (another Big word).
Irritation is the act of causing disturbance. Lets take an e.g. you are sitting and waiting for someone in a restaurant. And the person on the next table is patting his pen on table. You the very next moment would get irritated. Even though you know the actions of the other person is purely self indulging and does not harm you. We still want the other person to act with minimum decency or Code of conduct SET BY US. A small act that disturbs our calmness right before something good.
Frustration builds up when someone or something prevents or hinders our plans or efforts to achieve our desires. Like the example we took above the man wants to control everything external is blaming everybody else the whole day and thus being RESISTED by everything, like I said in every topic whatever side you belong to right or wrong (perspective) you will always face some resistance. Now the level of frustration is controlled if the Resistance is low e.g. a docile wife (ohms law max. flow of electricity), and frustration is uncontrolled if Resistance is high & unbreakable e.g. your boss or our government who will never do things like we want.
In situations like above where resistance is very high we suffer from frustration that needs anger management. Every big or small matter causes our fuse to blow because we have no mechanism to get things done our way and thus no way to be happy. I hope you get what I’m trying to say. It’s a chain system.
Things out of control àLose calm à Get disturbed à Perform badly à Get AngryàMore things get out of controlà Get frustrated irritated irrationally angry à cycle repeats.
We are all laborers pulling our expectations, wishes, and dreams and never wondering “what if it doesn’t come true?” And when we even think of negative side we say “I don’t want to think about it. We should be positive.” That means things should be exactly MY WAY. Yes we should be positive but should not close our eyes. Pushing our dreams and expectations and happiness dependent on other external factors that are well beyond our control will always lead us to sadness or anger. Controlling anger is the idea of SELF-control, accepting the fact that only I can change what ever lies in me and that everyone else has there particular reason to think that they are correct. Every time we try to enter and dominate a person or situation we will be gifted with anger. Now the cycle has to be broken by us , every little thing won’t hurt us if we accept everybody has their reasons or at least try to accept it. This will definitely reduce your palpitation is little-little things and you will never need an Anger management course. J
P.S: The topic is too long I wish I could explain it in a better way. But it’s a basic observation would like to discuss it as per the real life possibilities. Comments and criticism welcome.
adios :)
