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02 | Anger and Depression

In my experience, anger and depression are two insidious ways the cunning entity known as fear disguises itself, and as we know, disguises are often intended to conceal the identity of someone or something that wishes us no good.

But anger and depression are two feelings I can easily recognize if I am paying attention. Therefore, I do my best to watch for these two emotions, and when they begin to rear their ugly heads, I look for the fear behind them. Sometimes it is easy to identify the source; other times the fear is more elusive. Yet I can always hunt it down if I am diligent in my quest.

Sometimes I must get more honest with myself than I would like. I must face some facts about myself that I don’t want to face, and admit that I am afraid of something I would not like to admit—even to myself. But it helps me locate the core of the problem, which helps me find a solution. Today I’m all about solutions, so I’m willing to make the admission, at least to myself. After all, I want life to be enjoyable. I despise being angry, and I dislike feeling depressed. Therefore, I have spent a lot of time looking for ways to defeat these two thieves of my time and life-energy.

Depression

When my first sponsor died in 2006, I fell into a mild depression. I call it mild because it seemed moderate for losing someone who had been such a tremendous help to me during my early years of recovery, someone with whom I had become so close. Someone I loved. As it turns out, it was a rather mild case, too. I cried only once. As I look back on this time, I can see that my grieving was reduced by the fact that he was old and his death was imminent. However, the greatest contributor to the mildness of my depression was the fact that we had a wonderful relationship. We never argued, we did many things together, he taught me a lot about staying in recovery and about life itself, and I truly loved him.

While death is a permanent loss, I knew he would live on with me, in my heart. Still, there was depression, albeit mild considering the occasion. I stopped to look at the reason for the depression. This was a case where it was easy to identify the cause. I had lost a great friend, but it didn’t stop there. The fear ran through me because I was uncertain of how life would go on without my sponsor. Whom would I turn to when I needed to talk? Who would provide me the advice and love that I got from him for five years? I had doubts about the future, and fear took advantage of this by slithering into my being and rocking my foundation. I had another sponsor lined up, but the fear of losing something I didn’t want to lose rode me hard, and the fear of not getting what I thought I might need in the future cracked the whip to egg my fear on.

I was amazed at what happened next. The grieving process was short and disturbed my life very little, even though I was distressed over the loss of a loved one—the one closest to me outside my immediate family. However, I had identified my fear, and I had discovered that I really only had to grieve for my loss and my fear of filling his shoes because of the wonderful relationship we had over the years.

While it may sound as though I am making this process of grieving rather simple, it was even simpler than I expected, and fear took advantage of that, too. For a time I was concerned that I wasn’t grieving properly. I thought that maybe I had lost my ability to grieve properly or that I was growing cold-hearted. My sponsor was my first close personal loss since entering recovery, so this was new turf for me. Then I got an email from a friend whom my sponsor had also sponsored. She wrote:

Mark,

How are you doing? Several times, I think, I am going to pick up the phone and call Chauncey, then I remember, damn, I can’t. I know he is with me and my spirit can call him, but have you felt that way? I know he wanted to go [he was in a lot of pain] and I was happy for him. I also know he didn’t want to leave his wife Viv, but he has been ready for some time now. How lucky we were to have worked with the best. 1941 [the year he got clean], wow! I feel extremely blessed to have had him in my life. He came at a very crucial time. I will miss him.

This helped me to feel a little better, but it also got me thinking. This is when I truly discovered the how and why of the ease of my transition through my depression over losing a loved one. I learned even more than that, though, and I will discuss that in a moment, but first let me show you how I responded.

I wrote:

I am doing very well. For a while, I was getting a little out of sorts around 9:00 every night because that was when I called him. I have overcome that with the knowledge that I can talk to him anytime now—just like I talk to God—and I call Vivian every night.

I have responded overly well to his passing, and I was even worried about how easily I have taken this whole thing, but I think it has a lot to do with the fact that I have no regrets about my relationship with him. I got to do a ton of stuff with him; I talked to him every day for over four years—more often than I talk to my own family members—and I shared my life with him. And now I do the best I can to honor him by living up to the things he taught me.

We were truly blessed by his presence in our lives. There is no doubt about that, and now it is our turn to bless others. He loved to say, “I got mine, you get yours,” and there are many ways that can be taken. Today I take it to mean that he had his journey, and now it is up to me to enjoy mine. In fact, I believe that if I don’t enjoy my life I am wasting my time.

I miss Chauncey on occasion, but I don’t spend a lot of time dwelling on that in a negative manner. Instead I do my best to remember to do what he would have me do, and it isn’t very hard to know what he would advise in most situations—the next right thing. As long as I keep it simple and keep my hand out to help the next person, I am carrying the message. And that is what Chauncey would have me do—carry the message!

Love,

Mark

While writing this email, I learned some very important things about grieving, especially when it comes to losing a loved one. I can lessen the depression by living well and maintaining my relationships while my loved ones are still alive. I have discovered that much of my grief and depression when someone close to me dies comes not from my sense of loss, but from my guilt over the things I wished I had done differently—my regrets—and the fear that builds in me from the fact that I will no longer have the opportunity to make things right.

I never had to make things right with Chauncey because we got off to a good start. We kept our relationship in proper working order throughout the remainder of his life. I have had to do some work on other relationships, which I neglected for a long time while I was drinking and drugging, and that is putting it very kindly. Today I do my best, on a daily basis, to live a good life and carefully maintain relationships with those I love.

I have taken the long way around the block to learn this important lesson, but I think there was good reason to take that little detour. I hope this little side trip will encourage us all to put more effort into the relationships that mean the most to us. Identifying fear in the midst of depression can be the last thing I want to do; however, if I can dredge up the will to look at the real cause of depression—fear—I can usually take the necessary steps to relieve its severity. In fact, quite often, simply taking some action in an attempt to come out of the depression will help me feel better. Many times doing something is better than doing nothing, but other times there is another solution.

Enjoying Depression

“Enjoying” depression may sound a little crazy, but it works for me every time. Of course, I’m not talking about clinical depression or anything that might require a doctor’s help or medication; I’m talking about regular, run-of-the-mill depression—what the experts call “dysthymia.” I discovered that enjoying my depression worked for me after talking with my sponsor.

One night when I called Chauncey, I was in a foul mood; I was depressed after having a bad day and didn’t know what to do to feel better. I can’t recall the exact reason for my mood, but I know it was real, and I know I was quite sad. After our usual cordial greeting, I started to talk about my bad day. I told him about my issues and said I was depressed. He replied, “Well, enjoy that.”

I said, “Enjoy it? What are you, nuts? I’m feeling depressed. How can I enjoy that?”

His reply was simple and direct, as usual. He told me that I should always enjoy my state of mind and my emotions. “They won’t kill you,” he said, “so why not learn to relax into them instead of fighting them?”

As usual, I was stumped at first, but after thinking about it I decided to try it. I figured that as long as I was going to be depressed, I might as well go ahead and enjoy the feeling, or at least go ahead and feel it, instead of fighting it. It took some serious conscious effort, but I made up my mind to do the best I could to relax into the depression and feel it, even though I didn’t think it would do me much good.

A surprising thing happened once I truly allowed myself to relax into the depression instead of spending most of my energy trying to fight it. While I actually felt slightly more depressed or felt it more intensely for a short time, I discovered that I had actually made a choice in the matter.

Instead of fighting a losing battle and continuing to feel bad, I chose to fully embrace the mood and let it have its way. I discovered that since I chose to feel bad, I could just as easily choose to feel good, although at first I wasn’t sure it would work.

For a short time, I reveled in my bad mood. At first I didn’t seem to have enough desire to change. However, after feeling depressed—especially feeling it with the intensity I was feeling it with after allowing it to have its way—I decided that I needed to do something about it. I decided I wanted to feel happy, or at least not quite as sad. And since simply fighting the depression had never worked before, I figured I would try being happy instead. What happened next was amazing.

I decided to be happy. Of course, it didn’t happen quickly; it took a little while, but I changed my mood faster than I ever had before. I changed it by changing it, not by fighting it. I learned to substitute happiness for sadness. It was like changing the station on the radio or choosing a different item from the menu at a restaurant, only not so fast.

You see, prior to this, I had always said to myself, “I will not be sad, I will not be sad,” or “I am sick of feeling depressed; I need to do something.” In this way I was maintaining focus on the sadness, and the bad mood survived and thrived, or at least lingered. When I took action toward literally changing my mood by shifting from sadness to happiness, it worked.

The first time I did this it took a while. But the more I have practiced it, the better I am at making the transition. This focus works for any mood. I can change from happy to sad if I want to, although it is harder for me because I always practice going the other way. I still can’t seem to make a case for wanting to trade a good mood for a bad one.

Since I needed to figure out ways to make myself happy, I had to do some homework. Through doing my homework, I have discovered several ways to change my mood, two of which are my favorites.

The first way to change my mood is through helping someone else. It doesn’t matter how I help them; it only matters that I do something for someone besides myself. I can hold a door open. Although that is a small thing, it does help me feel better, and I might have to do it many times before I make real progress. I have taken to shoveling snow for my elderly neighbors because wintertime in Michigan is a dull, boring, and depressing time of year, and because helping others helps ward off depression. The bigger the act of helping, the quicker I change my mood. Because helping others improves my mood, I usually look for opportunities in the course of an ordinary day. In this way, I work to maintain my good mood on a consistent basis, and at the same time I look for ways to help others, should I fall into a bad mood.

The other way I have found to change my mood comes from a saying I heard. Maybe I read it in a fortune cookie, but I don’t actually remember for sure. It says, “You can’t make someone else laugh without laughing yourself.”

While this can be more difficult than actually doing nice things for other people—because it is hard to find funny things to say or do when I feel down—it does work. And since just thinking of funny things can make me laugh, I can do this without anyone else around. I can read a funny book if my thinker seems mired in depression. I have purchased a few good joke books for just such occasions, and I am always on the lookout for good, funny books to put in my library for use during these times.

My sponsor taught me that problems were opportunities. For some people, changing their mood is a problem. I see a mood change as an opportunity to grow. The important thing to remember is that I work to change the mood, not fight against it, trying to make it go away. I need to provide a substitute—a better mood—just like when I replace bad habits with good ones. I should change my mood after I allow myself to feel the bad mood for a short time. By allowing myself to feel the undesirable mood, it helps create a quicker, more stable transition. It also helps me realize that a bad mood won’t hurt me and provides me with proof that I can choose my moods more easily than I might think.

When I fight against something, I have to keep it around. I can’t fight with another person if they leave my location, and I can’t fight a bad mood if it goes away, either. I believe that is why a bad mood sticks around if I fight it—because I need it for there to be a fight. For it to fight me, I must breathe life into it and prop it up. Without me, my bad mood cannot get bigger or stronger. Once I surrender to the mood and let it have its way for a time, the fight ends and I can dismiss it; I can let it go. If I don’t enjoy feeling poorly, then why not let it go? I have found that the easiest way to let one thing go is to replace it with something else, something I enjoy, like a good mood.

Dealing with simple depression is easier than I used to think. With a little practice I can make the switch from depressed to happy in a much shorter time than I ever could before, by using a couple of simple little tricks. I can also keep depression and other bad moods at bay by practicing these tricks on a daily basis. To do so, I need to do a little extra work each day, such as holding doors for others and being nice to people I don’t even know. I find that it is well worth the effort. Because of my many options, I find that there are several things that I can do to maintain my good mood.

One important tool I use is watching what I think. I will examine this more a little later. For now, let’s move on to anger—fear turned outward.

Anger

I don’t get mad very often, and there is good reason for that: it doesn’t do anything positive for me. Confucius said, “When anger rises, think of the consequences.” Unfortunately for me, once anger rises I do not think very well, let alone think of possible consequences. Therefore, I have found it best to notice anger at its first signs and stop it in its tracks by thinking of potential consequences as well as alternative courses of action. It is at this critical moment that I need not only to consider Confucius’s words of wisdom, but also another quotation from ancient times, by Pubilius Syrius, “You can accomplish by kindness what you cannot by force.” If the kind thing to do is to bite my tongue, this is the time to do it. I can usually apply a little restraint early in the process (and avoid biting my tongue off altogether), or I can let it run rampant later and suffer the consequences.

Anger is easy to recognize if I know what to look for. We all know what it feels like physically when anger begins to grow within us. And while we usually do not make a conscious list of the physical effects—the elevated blood pressure, the increased heart rate, the knot in our stomach—we can usually identify these manifestations as anger when they occur.

I do my best these days to be on the lookout for anger for two main reasons. First, I want to know that I am dealing with rising anger as early as possible. Second, I want to slow or stop its progress before it overtakes my mental capacity and reduces or eliminates my ability to deal with it in a productive manner.

The main reason I want to identify my anger before it takes over is that I have learned something important about anger, something I discovered during my recovery that I never considered until it confronted me through other people in the program. You see, I used to believe that someone or something had made me mad. Today I know better.

You cannot make me mad. No one can make me mad. Nothing can make me mad.

While anger is often considered a part of the human fight-or-flight response to a perceived threat, whether real or imagined, it can quickly take over my entire being if I do not take conscious control of my situation. Allowing anger to run my life—even for a short time—can cause me to do things I will later regret. I believe this happens when I am angry or stressed beyond any reasonable or normal measure. If I can’t think straight due to stress, then I am not really my normal, calm self, and I am liable to say and do things that I would not do if I were in a calm, relaxed state.

Therefore, I find it best to see the anger coming and either lock the door and deny it entry, or open the front and back doors, allowing it to pass through quickly—hopefully without making much of a mess. After all, if I allow anger to run me for very long, and I do things I will regret, others affected by my anger will not soon forget my outburst. Nor will they likely allow me to use my anger as an excuse or alibi for my behavior. The potentially more serious issue is that I’m not likely to forgive myself and allow my anger to be an acceptable excuse. There is good reason for this.

You cannot make me mad. No one can make me mad. Nothing can make me mad.

Anger is a choice. For anger to control and dominate me, I must allow it. Anger cannot make me do anything unless I let it. People can do things that I don’t like. They can even do things to me that I don’t like. But I still have to choose, consciously or not, to be angry about it, or at the very least I must know that it is I who allow anger to take over my situation.

When I was introduced to the idea that anger was a choice, I rejected it. After all, I was used to saying things like “You made me mad,” which put the blame on the other person, or so I thought.

The truth is that you did something, I didn’t like it, and I got angry!

My choice of words, my saying to you, “You made me mad,” made it seem as though it was your fault that I got mad. I have discovered through trial and error that I can choose not to get mad almost anytime I want.

There are exceptions to every rule, and no matter how hard I try I will still get angry, but that doesn’t mean I should not take responsibility for my anger. It is my emotion—not yours. Since it is my emotion, if I say, “You made me mad,” then you made me mad because I let you, I gave you permission, and I gave you control of my emotions—even if subconsciously, and only for a moment, I handed over control of my being to you. Whomever or whatever it is that I allowed to make me mad, I still gave control of myself over to someone or something outside myself.

Knowing and understanding this about me, I take close control of my anger whenever I catch it rearing its ugly head. I also take control of it because anger is a tool. Used properly, my anger has benefits, but only if I choose to see it that way.

Anger tells me that something is wrong. Sometimes there is something wrong with the way other people are acting or the things they are doing. Other times I may get angry at the state of the world and the way those in control are running things. There are too many things to get mad about to list them all here. But as I have watched my anger, I have noticed that no matter where the anger comes from, no matter the cause, anger is telling me that something is wrong.

The truth is: whatever is wrong is usually wrong with me.

Of course, there are times when I can justifiably and properly carry my anger. I imagine I would be angry if someone robbed me or held me up at gunpoint. But the more likely reasons for my anger stem from everyday occurrences such as someone pulling out in front of me in traffic, a coworker causing problems at work, or someone trying to cut in front of me in line at the supermarket. When one of these things happens, anger can grow quickly, and I am liable to act out unless I can catch the anger and channel its energy into something more productive.

What can be more productive is a solution. If someone pulls out in front of me, the solution can be as simple as allowing them to go about their business while letting go of any anger attached to the situation. Odds are that in an hour or two I will have forgotten about the situation anyway. A potentially more serious situation can come from a coworker who has caused a problem at work. Maybe they have taken credit for my work and I think I need that credit in order to secure a promotion; this is the fear of not getting something I want. Odds are that getting angry will not make matters lean more in my favor. The boss is not likely to believe me, let alone give me credit, if I begin to rant and rave during our meeting that so-and-so “stole” my idea. Such a response sounds rather childish and will not curry any favor with my boss.

If I allow my anger to control my situation, I am apt to do just that—rant and rave. However, if I can get a grip on my anger, I can handle myself more appropriately in the situation. I can keep my cool and my ability to think, and I can address the issue with a calm resolve to correct the misunderstanding.

There is an old saying: “He who strikes the first blow admits he’s lost the argument.” If I strike the first blow in a meeting, whether the blow is physical or verbal, I may lose my opportunity to take corrective action, and may appear rather juvenile in the process. My anger, which has signaled to me that something is wrong, can actually come in handy by giving me the necessary resolve to correct the issue. But I may ruin any future attempt at corrective action if I blow up in front of a roomful of my coworkers. I need to remember that just because my sneaky coworker has claimed responsibility for my great idea, it doesn’t mean that is the last word on the subject.

Things can often be corrected or fixed.

I remember leaving a meeting to go to lunch with a young man I was sponsoring. We were in my car and had gone only a few blocks when we stopped at a red light to wait for it to turn green. While we were sitting still, another car hit us. The accident was by no stretch of the imagination my fault; my car wasn’t even moving when we were hit.

I got out of my car to see if the people in the other car were okay, even though I was certain they were because the accident took place at less than ten miles per hour. When the occupants of the other vehicle and I met for the first time, we began discussing how to handle the situation. They were on their lunch hour and needed to get back to work; we were on our way to lunch and were hungry. Neither car was damaged badly, but both cars would spend some time in the repair shop.

The person driving the other car said she had never done anything like this before and asked me what we should do. I told her that since she was in a hurry, I thought we could simply exchange information—driver’s license, insurance, and phone numbers—and report it to the police at our earliest convenience. She said she would call them when she got back to work. I told her that would be fine, and we went on our way.

When we got back in my car, my sponsee said, “I can’t believe the way you handled that.” When I asked him if I had done something wrong, he replied, “No, I mean you didn’t even get mad. She wrecked your car. Aren’t you upset?”

“Of course I’m upset,” I replied, “but no one was hurt and cars can be fixed.”

“I thought you’d rip that lady a new one,” my sponsee said, then laughed and added, “I would have. I know it.”

“I think she felt bad enough without getting chewed out,” I said. “Still hungry?” Soon we went off to lunch, my sponsee still marveling at my calmness; I was, too, just a little bit. That was the first accident I had been in while in recovery, and I was a little surprised at how calmly I had handled the situation. Then I realized something else.

Until that moment, I had no idea that during the episode my sponsee was eying every move I made. I never did get mad. Sure, I felt anger—based on a fear of losing something I had—but I quickly asked myself what good it would do to let anger run the situation. I decided that anger over the possibility that I would temporarily lose my car would only make things worse, so I dismissed it for cause. Instead, the transaction took place in a calm and orderly fashion. The accident was obviously the other person’s fault, and I felt certain the damage on the vehicles would bear that out even if she didn’t admit fault. As it happened, after lunch, almost as soon as I got home, there was a knock at my door. A police officer had come to investigate the accident. I showed the officer my car and he said it looked exactly like what he was told. As it turned out, the other driver admitted fault and the rest of the matter was easily resolved. I drove a rental car for a few days while my car was repaired. Things could have happened differently, but I am inclined to believe that the woman acted the way she did because I acted in a civil manner. Had I acted out of anger, it could only have made things worse, because this situation went about as well as an accident can go.

I’m not saying everything in life goes better without anger, or that I can avoid or dismiss anger easily. When this accident happened, I had been practicing dismissing my anger when I felt it would make things worse for some time. On this occasion, I happened to get it right and things went smooth as silk. Life isn’t always this simple, but I have experienced enough anger-provoking situations now to realize that remaining calm is the way to go. I can save face by not acting like a crazed person. When I remain calm and keep my wits about me, I can analyze the situation more clearly, be more honest with myself, and generally get better results all around.

I Get Maddest When I Am Wrong

I hate to admit when I am wrong. I think everybody hates to admit when he or she is wrong. I might be wrong now. Because I hate to admit when I am wrong, I tend to get my defenses up when I find myself in a situation where I know I am at fault. This usually causes me to get angry—angrier than I would be if I knew I was right. Here are two examples, one when I knew I was right and the other when I knew I was wrong. The outcomes were very different.

A good friend once confronted me about how I had handled a situation with the volunteer helpline I was managing. The friend confronted me about a woman who had neglected to show up for a shift. The woman was young and attractive and my friend knew I favored her. She was far too young for me to date, but I liked her just the same. My friend accused me of giving her preferential treatment because of my feelings for her. I disagreed. An argument ensued, albeit one that started out calmly enough. My friend stuck to his guns and I stuck to mine. To prove my point, I suggested that he look at how smoothly things had run during my tenure as manager of the helpline. I calmly explained that when the young woman did not show up, the person on the previous shift called me looking for help. I got in my car, drove in, and took the shift.

My friend claimed that I wouldn’t have done that for another person. I pointed out that I did it whenever that sort of thing happened. My friend got mad and refused to believe me. He claimed again and again that I went out of my way to keep the young woman from looking bad. I informed him that since it was a volunteer helpline, there was no one to look bad to besides me, since I was the chairperson. I wasn’t bothered by those who did not show up. The helpline was relatively new and people were still not used to the idea that they needed to make sure they covered their shift no matter what else might be happening in their lives. I did my best to make sure every shift operator handled things properly, and when someone didn’t show up for his or her shift, I would go in to cover the shift, then have a talk with the person who had failed to work their shift in order to avoid it happening again.

When one of the volunteers did not report for a shift, the volunteer on the previous shift called me looking for relief, and I always followed up with the person who’d missed his or her shift. My game plan was the same for this young woman as it was for the other volunteers. No matter how much I either liked or disliked someone, I had to treat everyone the same. I told this to my friend. He refused to believe me, and his anger grew. Soon he was yelling at me. I sat back in my chair and let him rant. My only response was to remain calm and to reiterate the facts, as I understood them. I did my best to assure him that I would handle the situation as I always did. Finally my friend got up, told me I was hard-headed, and went into the other room.

I felt my own anger rise up, but knowing it would make things worse, I dismissed it and said, as calmly as I could, “I know you are mad. When you calm down maybe we can continue this conversation.” This was relatively early in my days of anger management, and I was amazed at the fact that I actually did a decent job of dealing with my anger.

After a few moments, my friend came back and sat down. “You’re serious,” he said. “You really expect me to believe that you handled this situation just as you would with anyone else.”

I assured him that I did, and I would continue to handle these situations in the same manner regardless of who was involved. We continued talking and resolved our differences. Our friendship was undamaged. I continued to handle those situations without prejudice until the day I left that position. Today my friend and I laugh about that conflict. We both learned from it. Moreover, when he said he hated being wrong, it reminded me and educated me about how mad I get when I am wrong.

Looking back on that incident, I realized that every time I have been wrong, I have tended to get angrier than when I was right. The car accident was one situation where I did nothing wrong and I found it easy to dismiss any anger. However, when my mind quickly settles on a situation where I am wrong and I know I am wrong, my anger takes over—seemingly without my permission.

My former girlfriend had set up a dinner date with a couple that she knew. She told me about the dinner date and I agreed to go. When the day came for the date, I had other plans. Forgetting about the date, I had agreed to go out with friends of my own—an obvious mistake on my part. Being wrong, and knowing I was wrong, I got angry. After all, I was going to lose a chance to go out with my friends, and I would look bad in the eyes of my friends who would think that my girlfriend ran the show. I felt I had to defend my position.