How to control anger before it controls you

We all know what anger is and we have all felt it, either as fleeting or as total fury.

Anger is totally normal and usually healthy human emotion. However, when we lose control of this emotion and it becomes destructive, it can cause many problems at work, in personal relationships and in the general quality of life. It can make you feel as if you are at the mercy of an unpredictable and powerful emotion.

How to express anger

The natural and instinctive way to express anger is to respond aggressively. Anger is a natural response that adapts to threats and inspires intense often aggressive feelings, and behaviors that allow us to fight and defend ourselves when we feel attacked. Therefore, a certain degree of anger is necessary to survive.

On the other hand, we cannot physically attack every person or object that irritates or bothers us. Laws, social norms and common sense impose limits on how far we can allow our anger to take us.

People use a variety of conscious and unconscious processes to deal with their feelings of anger. The three main reactions are to express, repress and calm down.

Expressing your feelings of anger firmly but without aggressiveness is the healthiest way to express anger. To do so, you must learn how to make clear what your needs are and how to do them without hurting others. Being firm does not mean being arrogant or demanding; It means respecting yourself and others.

Another way to address this reaction is to suppress anger and then convert or redirect it. This happens when you contain your anger, stop thinking about it and instead concentrate on doing something positive. The goal is to inhibit or suppress your anger and turn it into much more constructive behavior. The danger in this type of response is that it does not allow you to express your anger, being able to stay within your internal jurisdiction. The anger that remains in your inner jurisdiction can cause hypertension, high blood pressure or depression.

Unexpressed anger can generate other problems. It can lead to expressions of pathological anger such as passive-aggressive behavior (retaliating with people indirectly, without telling them the reason, instead of facing it) or a lasting cynical and hostile attitude. People who are constantly belittling others, criticizing everything and making cynical comments, have not learned to express their anger constructively. It is not surprising then, to find that they are not likely to establish successful relationships.

Finally, you can calm down inside. This means not only controlling your external behavior but also controlling your internal responses, following the steps to reduce your heart rate, calm down and let feelings pass.

Anger management

The goal of anger management is to reduce your emotional feelings and the physiological awakening it causes. If you can't get rid of things or people that make you angry, or avoid them, or change them, you can learn to control your reactions. 
Are you too angry?

There is psychological evidence that measures the intensity of feelings of anger, how prone to anger you are and how well you can handle it. There are many possibilities that if you have a problem with anger, you already know. If you feel that you are acting in ways that seem out of control and alarming, you may need help finding better ways to deal with this emotion.

Why do some people get angry more than others?

Some people really exalt themselves more than others getting angry more easily and more intensely than average. Also, there are those who do not show their anger screaming but are chronically irritable and moody. People who get angry easily do not always insult and throw things; Sometimes they withdraw socially, become bitter or get sick.

People who get angry easily, usually have what psychologists call a low tolerance for frustration, which means they feel they should not be subject to frustration, irritation or inconvenience. They cannot take things slowly and become enraged, especially if the situation seems in some way unfair, for example, when corrected for a minor mistake.

What makes these people like this? There are several factors. A factor can be of genetic or physiological origin. There is evidence that some children are born irritable, sensitive and angry easily, and these signs are present from a very young age. Another factor may be associated with the way they are taught to deal with anger. Anger is often considered as something negative; Many teach us that it is okay to express anxiety, depression and other emotions, but it is not right to express anger. As a result, we do not learn how to handle it or channel it constructively.

Research also found that family history plays an important role. Generally, people who get angry easily come from troubled, chaotic families with no capacity for emotional communication.