Читать книгу Managing Anger: Simple Steps to Dealing with Frustration and Threat - Gael Lindenfield, Gael Lindenfield - Страница 6

To most of us, the word ‘anger’ conjures up fearful and unpleasant images. In our minds, this is an emotion we generally associate with scenes of abuse, hurt, violence and destruction. But this dreadful reputation is very unfair to this natural, basic emotion. After all, it is actually designed to be a positive and constructive aid to survival. Its function is to provide us with vital boosts of both physical and emotional energy, just when we are most in need of either protection or healing.

But it is hard to remember the positive nature of anger today. Not only are we bombarded by media stories depicting the awful power of uncontrolled anger, we are also surrounded in our daily life by examples of people desperately trying to pretend that they have risen above this primitive animal emotion. This is not surprising when we consider that most of us were brought up to believe that anger was the response of the unenlightened savage to frustration, threat, violation and loss. As more civilized beings, we were urged, both directly and indirectly, to ‘keep cool’ and ‘turn the other cheek’. Our reward, we were assured, would be a place in heaven – plus fortune, power and happiness in this life as well!

But, many of us, newly empowered with self-awareness and the skills of confidence, are now challenging this myth. We realize that ‘gritting our teeth’ ruins our health, ‘grinning and bearing it’ destroys our relationships, and being ‘too nice’ inhibits our ability both to succeed at work and put right the wrongs of this very unfair world.

However, in making the attempt to reclaim the positive power of anger, I have noticed that disappointment and disillusionment are commonplace. The old habits sometimes seem impossibly hard to break. So, against our better judgement, many of us still find ourselves:

– unable to feel angry, even when we think we should, and so continuing to suffer abuse of our rights

– ‘going over the top’ with rage at the most inappropriate times and places

– taking out our frustration on our nearest or dearest or those least able to defend themselves

– crying when we would prefer to bawl and shout, or at least argue assertively

– rendered speechless and motionless with fury

– getting stuck in a depression when faced with loss instead of becoming angry and healthily completing our grieving

– being too cowardly and passive in the face of other people’s anger and then torturing ourselves with guilt and shame

– unable to control our own anger, even when those who irritate us may be too young, old or sick to handle our outbursts

– haunted by nightmares or daydreams of spiteful and violent revenge

– running to the doctor with headaches, ulcers and hypertension caused by holding in tight the steam boiling within us.

If the bells of recognition have started ringing, this is certainly the book for you!