I married a very mild tempered man. After 29 years of marriage, I can count on one hand the number of times Mike has lost his temper, but I do remember the first time!
We had only been married about a year and were living in a little cottage on a farm. It consisted mainly of 2 large rooms divided by a short passage off which was a bathroom and a tiny second bedroom. I can’t remember what I had done to make him mad, but he was furious. As it was winter, in our bedroom was a little fan heater and Mike poured out all his fury by booting this heater down the passage. For Mike that was bad enough, but it got worse when I innocently walked out of the bathroom, straight into the path of the oncoming heater. It hit me on the shin, leaving a neat swollen bruise.
I’ll never forget Mike’s reaction. He was mortified. All his anger melted away and was instantly replaced with remorse and apologies.
I’ve “gone off pop” enough times to feel embarrassed, but as time has passed and we have matured and learned better communication skills, I’m grateful to say that if you were a fly on the wall in our home, you would not hear screaming and shouting. We just don’t scream at each other.
Anger is a normal human emotion but when out of control it is dangerous and destructive. Angry people are like dormant volcanoes. You just don’t know when they are going to erupt. The anger seems to flow through their veins making those around walk on eggshells. Unless dealt with anger could sentence you to a lifelong emotional prison of negativity and a miserable lifestyle for your husband or wife.
The American Psychological Association in a brochure called “Controlling Anger, before it controls you” explains that there are three ways of controlling anger. The first is expressing your anger in an assertive manner. This is not aggressive. It’s a way of explaining your needs in a clear controlled way without being demanding or hurting others. It’s the best way to deal with your anger. Express it so that you get what you want but do it in a manner that is persistent but polite. It’s assertive, not aggressive.
The second way is by suppressing anger and then converting it or re-directing it. In other words instead of getting it out, you keep it bottled up inside, you may try and focus your thoughts on something else or go to gym to relieve the stress. This may work on a temporary basis but suppressed anger over a period of time can lead to problems. It may lead to out of control pathological behavior or it may result in a long term cynical unhappy personality.
The third technique in handling anger is calming. This is a determined conscious response to reducing tension, taking a few deep breaths, asking yourself how important this will be in ten years and allowing the angry feeling to subside.
According to Charles Spielberger, PhD, a psychologist who specializes in the study of anger, “when none of these three techniques work, that’s when someone—or something—is going to get hurt.”
Some of the techniques in dealing with anger as recommended by the American Psychological Association include:
- Deep Breathing.
- Changing your way of Thinking.
- Problem Solving.
- Better Communication.
- Using Humour.
- Changing your Environment.
Anger destroys relationships. It makes family members walk on eggshells and that’s not a way to live. Constant anger and bickering between parents is one of the most destructive interactions to expose to children. It drives them away from home and family. It can also rub off on them so that they display the same way of dealing with their issues. They in turn diffuse their anger with outburst of screaming and shouting. It’s the worst way of running your home. If it is what is going on behind your closed doors, decide to stop it today. We cannot control other people but we can control ourselves.
If you or the family members in your home cannot control their anger, seek professional help.
James 1:19-20
Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.
God bless you!
In His Grip,
Helga xx 🙂