Self-Care

How Can You Manage Your Anger? Anger Management Tips

January 5, 2021
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How Can You Manage Your Anger? Anger Management Tips

Anger is a very common emotion for people and statistically, one in four adults has committed an act of road rage and 13 out of a thousand people have been physically attacked as a result of anger.

This is actively a very common issue and people experience rage or they experience acts of aggression or based on people’s anger.

The statistics showed that one out ten people have expressed that their anger at times has felt uncontrollable. So for people, anger can be a massive issue.

Now, what’s pop up in your head when we hear about anger management?

Anger management is about the ability to control or manage anger not necessarily to get rid of it. Anger management is not anger destruction, it’s not anger eradication.

For instance, an alcoholic who undergoes an alcoholism treatment program where people are trying to eradicate their alcohol intake. If people are addicted to alcohol they need to get it out of their life or completely rid of it. 

We’ll that is not the case with anger because anger is a perfectly normal emotion. Being able to control anger is important not necessarily to get rid of it. We need anger because it is an appropriate response to issues that require it. If you did not have an anger response to some things then some stuff would never get done.

READ: Five Ways to Deal with Difficult People

If people were not angry about injustices or social oppression, then nothing would get done to rectify those issues.

Now, when anger is mismanaged or excessive or violent in some instances which do happen, that’s where anger management needs to come in place.

So how do we manage our anger?

1. We need to recognize that being angry is OKAY

It’s okay to have angry emotions and if you get to a point where you think you have bad anger and you need to manage your emotion. Every time you feel that angry emotion, you need to suppress or reduce it. By doing so, it will drive more and more sensitivity to anger and it can be counterintuitive.

2. Acknowledge and Identify the Anger

This makes it very much easier at least to reduce the subsequent shame and guilt that can be responded to as a result of anger. So often what can happen with people who have real anger issues is that when they feel very angry, they can have a subsequent feeling of shame.

Being aware and identify the anger when it happens can be very powerful because anger emotions can feel out of control.

We bring a level of control to them by identifying and acknowledging them in a situation that’s making you feel angry and recognizing your anger.

3. Identifying Triggers

If we’re able to identify triggers we’re much more equipped, prepared, and can anticipate or avoid the anger and utilize coping strategies to manage the anger.

For example, if you’re a basketball fan and when your team is losing then you get a trigger of adrenaline or anger that hits you. That trigger of watching basketball is something that needs to be managed to some degree or not. Maybe you need to reduce the amount of basketball you watch.

A basketball fan doesn’t necessarily need to be that he takes basketball out of his life. He just can anticipate right, “I know that If my team is losing, I can feel very angry. Here’s what I need to do instead to manage that anger in a little bit better.” 

4. Look at the Bigger Picture

It sounds basic but it can be a really important step when it comes to anger management. The reason behind this is that what often can happen when angry emotions get out of control and impactful in our lives is that we become so focused on one thing that’s causing the anger and we lose sight of everything else around it.

Like our example above, a basketball fan who gets angry at his team losing. Looking at the bigger picture and recognizing that it’s just a game or it’s just a bit fun.

Looking at the bigger picture can be a really helpful exercise and often a visualization process can be utilized in therapy times. Thinking about like an eagle’s eye view of the scene what are some of the other things going on around the basketball game. 

5. Clearing process

This process requires you to take some time away from that person and later approach them when you’re feeling more distant from an anger-provoking situation.

It’s not that you feel calmer, that’s about feeling more distant because necessarily often just creating space or getting away from a situation will make us feel calmer. It can create distance and that’s important to take distance from the anger-provoking situation, then come back and request to speak to that person and express the following:

a. How you’re feeling about the situation?

b. Why you feel it?

c. What you want to happen?

d. What are willing to do to mediate that situation?

Now that could include admitting that you are wrong and you’re not fair or something to that effect.

6. Journal for Anger or Anger Diary

Allowing anger or angry thoughts to be taken out of our minds and onto paper written down can be powerful. The process of writing it down can be helpful and by reading it reflecting on it can be even more powerful.

Allowing anger or angry thoughts to be taken out of our minds and onto paper written down can be powerful. The process of writing it down can be helpful and by reading it reflecting on it can be even more powerful.