Last update: June 01, 2017
Letting the knot of anger take away the air and make us drown will lead, sooner or later, to the appearance of pangs of anger and, with them, the hurricane that puts words in our mouth that we later regret . Learning to manage emotions will always be healthier, more logical and more practical than ending up having a meaningless argument.
We know that at first glance this advice may seem easy, innocent, and even too obvious. We say this for a very specific reason: handling negative emotions such as anger or anger are our unfinished business, our Achilles heel. In fact, there is no lack of those who walk with their adult suit and their heads held high, while inside hides the emotional maturity of a 4-year-old child.
“Anyone can get angry: this is easy. But getting angry with the right person, and in the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way: this is not within anyone's power and it is not easy. "
- Aristotle -
We must take into account that anger extends its ramifications beyond the world of emotions. Our language and our cognition are enveloped by the long tentacles of opposing, sharp and tremendously frustrated feelings. However, there is an excess of those who swallow them, those who swallow them and disguise them by pretending an ingenious normality.
Little by little and day after day this lethal virus causes massacres. Communication becomes aggressive, manners unequal, self-esteem falls and blackmails, emotional fluctuations and even psychosomatic disturbances appear through which the body highlights the malaise of the mind.
Below, we explain how to deal with this so common reality.
The anger in me that you don't see
To understand how and how the universe of anger is part of our daily life, we will start with a very simple example. Amelia had a bad day at work. She arrives and returns home late and when she crosses the threshold of the house, Giacomo, her partner, tells her that she will go out because she has organized herself with some friends. However, before he leaves, he asks her if it's okay with her or if he'd rather stay home with her. Amelia tells him that she does nothing, that she "does what she prefers, that there is no problem".
The next morning, our protagonist cannot help but feel the insufferable pang of anger. She is sick because her partner has not been able to see in her face the signs of a bad day, of his despair and of her despair. Now her malaise has increased because Giacomo has not been able to notice even her apathy at her breakfast or the shadow of that anger that wanders inside her like a wounded animal in a cage.
Certainly this situation would have developed in another way if Amelia had explained to Giacomo, first of all, that she had had a bad day, that she was not well, that she was broken inside, that she was in pieces and that she needed his support. However, sometimes the circumstances get complicated, doubts appear and the desperate desire that others understand without words what hurts us.
On the other hand, this situation is also justified by a specific fact that starts directly from everything that is taught since childhood: “control yourself, hide, seem normal”. Self-control is perhaps the least understood dimension in the field of emotional intelligence.
Nobody can forcibly control something they don't understand. You can't put a lion in a cage if you don't understand its needs and nature first. However, it is clear that we cannot go around the world roaring and clawing, but we can be honest and say aloud a simple "no, I'm not fine, I had a bad day today".
- The second step is to be aware of your arousal level. When we are very nervous and anger controls us, it will be really difficult to think normally and make constructive decisions. We need to get some air, breathe, calm down, free our minds ...
- The following strategy that we will put into practice is a little more complex: you have to examine your own emotional conflict. What is really bothering me? What makes me sick and why? What is debilitating me so much? To what extent am I responsible?
-Finally, and with the priorities already clear, we will put the most important strategy into motion. An element that needs time to be learned, but which must be put into practice every day: assertive communication. To talk and to resolve a misunderstanding or conflicting situation, there is no need to hurt.
We must learn, therefore, to be good managers of our negative emotions, we must understand that communicating means reaching agreements, positioning oneself with respect, but also being able to create bridges to improve coexistence.
