Explosiveness, low tolerance, impatience, and other characteristics are part of poor anger control.
Last update: July 28, 2022
Fury, anger, aggression and impatience characterize inadequate anger control. The person who fails to manage this emotion properly is often the victim of an escalation that can culminate in violence.
In this article we explain why outbursts of anger occur and what strategies to adopt to avoid being overwhelmed by this emotion.
Anger
One of the six fundamental and universal emotions that Charles Darwin described along with sadness, disgust, fear, surprise and joy is anger. This it is a complex and primitive emotion, like the others that accompany us throughout our life.
It arises mainly in problematic situations, for example in the face of injustice or in response to aggression or difficulty. For the so-called "hotheads", however, there are enough futile reasons to give vent to their anger.
The outburst can be directed towards the surrounding environment, through explosive conduct, verbal aggression or physical violence, or towards oneself, against one's body, which has different consequences.
Anger is an emotion that causes various physiological effects, such as an increase in heart rate and blood pressure, which activates the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and increases the secretion of adrenaline and noradrenaline.
The control of the prefrontal area of ​​the brain that deals with the management of impulses, moral conduct and self-control is also lost.
Physiological activation during a tantrum
Explosiveness in anger is characterized by physiological activation in which the body reacts by defense or attack.
The person thus turns into a barbarian about to go to war against the Roman army: the muscles stiffen, the nostrils open in search of more oxygen, the heartbeat increases in frequency as well as the breath, the flow of blood. bursts and the teeth are also shown highlighting the canines and clenching the jaws.
Likewise, the body releases cholesterol and catecholamines which accelerate the formation of fat deposits in the heart and arteries.
Anger hurts because the explosive person attacks the alleged aggression towards him. In other words, the answer depends on how the situation is interpreted. Behind every explosion, there is a paranoid person who thinks that others conspire against him and want to belittle.
The angry person, therefore, is an "ugly duckling" who needs to be recognized. The problem is that even the most trivial reasons can unleash the fury. Therefore, there are not few occasions in which the angry person kicks, punches or throws objects and then repents.
However, the anger does not necessarily cause a violent outburst. This is just one of the many ways an escalation of anger can culminate. There are actually three ways:
- Vent the anger to the outside;
- Implosion, that is to discharge anger towards oneself, generating different physiological conditions from psychosomatic disorders such as dermatitis, ulcers, hemorrhoids and gastrointestinal disorders, to more serious conditions.
- Double game of explosion and implosion: this group not only throws the grenade, but swallows it. Not only do they maintain hostile relationships with others, but they inflict pain on themselves.
Traits of the person with poor anger control
Those who show poor anger control are used to throwing digs at others, but when they are the target of the same conduct by others, they quickly become irritated. He does not tolerate it and shows it in a way that discourages those in front of him.
Because he has a reputation for being short-tempered, the people who know the angry person fear his reactions and measure their attitudes so as not to trigger catastrophic explosions.
Those who cannot control anger also tend to never take responsibility for events, but always blame others for their reactions.
They are also impatient people. Waiting gives them time to develop ideas such as feeling neglected, not respected, to the point of considering waiting an attack on their person. In turn, this inevitably causes an escalation to the explosion. This combination is fatal when we add intolerance.
The latter is the inability to accept different opinions. It is therefore synonymous with stubbornness and intransigence towards people who may have different ideas, for example in politics, religion, sexuality, race, etc. The equation is Anger + Impatience + Intolerance = Explosion.
Consequences of the attacks of anger
The person gets angry, does not tolerate, is impatient. It is quite common for this combination to occur sporadically, but it becomes a problem when it is systematized. Such repeated conduct causes such levels of stress that affect psychologically, emotionally and physically.
An emotion that often arises after the explosion is repentance. In anger, the person cannot control himself and yells at those around him, but feels guilty after the climax has occurred.
Following this, he will explicitly apologize or adopt attitudes or gestures to reconnect with the recipient of his anger. Guilt, shame and subsequent regret are part of the anger attacks.
Tips for Better Anger Control
It's not easy to break the automatism of anger attacks, but the following tips can be very helpful:
- Ask yourself “Why am I angry? What makes me angry? " This already implies a braking factor when climbing. And let's not cheat by blaming the other! it is a self-reflective exercise that helps to take responsibility.
- Thinking “The others don't belittle me because they think differently from me”. If others have divergent ideas, it doesn't mean that they consider us stupid.
- Take your distance. When anger builds up, it's important to get away from the minefield, get some fresh air and cool off. Likewise, it is useful to change rooms or take a shower. The point is to block the escalation and for this reason it is important to get out of the communicative chaos by changing the environment.
- Put yourself in someone else's shoes. Developing empathy allows you to understand the other and give a minimum of credibility to your thoughts. We must repeat "others may have different ideas from mine".
- Playing sports it is also a healthy way to channel all that energy that is discharged through anger. Sport is a healthy activity that, in addition to offering the traditional cardiorespiratory and muscular benefits, activates endorphins and improves mood.
Conclusions
Anger is not a personality trait, but rather an emotional state that can be systematized in life and it is important to correct it. As an adaptive emotion, anger allows you to set healthy boundaries.
Improving anger control does not mean pretending to be a Zen master or being serotonergic all the time, or doing self-relaxing breathing exercises like Rabi Shankar. Instead, it means learn to correct the triggers of explosiveness and harm oneself and others.
