The importance of healthy anger

Why is anger so hard for many of us? In this article, we’ll look at how anger shows up and explain what healthy anger really means.

Anger – friend or foe?

Many people struggle with anger. We don’t like feeling angry and may not know how to handle it. As a result, we bottle it up or express it in unhealthy ways.

But anger is actually an important emotion. It helps us set boundaries, take care of ourselves, and can even strengthen our relationships.

If we want to be healthy, we need to feel and express our emotions. Gabor Maté writes in his book When the Body Says No that holding back our emotions can seriously damage our health. The feeling of anger can be especially tough, making the urge to hide it even stronger!

So let’s go explore our anger and find out what it really is.

Anger is a natural and powerful feeling we are all born with that helps us stand up for ourselves and say, “I matter!”

Healthy anger helps us create positive change. It enables us to speak up when things feel unfair and gives us the energy to address problems in our relationships.

Unhealthy anger

Unhealthy anger, on the other hand, can do a lot of damage.

It can show up as:

• yelling and screaming
• accusing others
• using abusive language
• smashing or throwing things or slamming doors
• physical violence

Unhealthy anger can also show up in indirect ways, known as passive-aggressive behaviors:

• sarcasm
• moodiness, sulking, or pouting
• giving the silent treatment
• constant complaining or playing the victim
• compliments that seem nice but are actually insulting
• subtle sabotage via procrastination or ‘forgetting’ to do tasks

Another kind of unhealthy anger is when we completely push it down. We might not even know we are angry. Holding back anger can cause health problems like high blood pressure, tight muscles, depression, headaches, and anxiety. In relationships, it can make us feel numb or lead us to pull away from others.

The dilemma of anger

Anger is a normal feeling that helps us protect our boundaries. But it comes with a challenge that can make it hard to handle.

Anger can feel and look aggressive or confrontational. But most of us don’t want to appear aggressive; we want to get along with others. Showing anger can therefore make us feel guilty or anxious. We want to express ourselves, but we don’t want to push people away.

To keep the peace, we might repress our anger, building up internal stress over time. Or we might go to the other extreme and let our anger explode, damaging our relationships.

So, how do we handle this dilemma of anger?

Healthy anger

We need to find healthy ways to deal with our anger. Bottling it up, acting passive-aggressively, or having angry outbursts are all unhealthy ways to cope.

There are a few steps we can take to handle anger in a healthy way.

The first step is to calm down ourselves down. We can do this by taking deep breaths, counting to ten before responding, or taking a short walk.

Next, we can think about what made us angry. What happened? Did somebody cross a boundary or hurt our feelings?

After considering the situation, we can decide how to handle our anger. Do we want to express it in some way?

Sometimes, it’s important to share our anger, especially with people close to us. It can help solve problems or clear up misunderstandings, and in the end, might even bring us closer. Other times, it might not be the right time to share.

If we choose to share our anger, it helps to use non-blaming phrases. “I felt hurt when…” or “I was upset by what happened” is better than “You always do this to me”. This lets the other person know how we feel without attacking or blaming them. We need to express our anger directly and honestly while still respecting the other person’s feelings and boundaries.

There are times when our anger comes from within, stemming from past experiences or old wounds. In these cases, our anger is a sign that there is something inside we need to work on. The main focus here should be on our own healing.

Learning to manage anger takes time. The goal is to know and understand our anger, so that it no longer feels like an enemy.

Dealing with our anger doesn’t mean we have to do it perfectly. We need to notice, think about it, and allow ourselves to feel it in our bodies rather than ignore it. By doing this, we control our anger rather instead of letting it control us.