Anger is like a person that we deal with every day. He comes to meet us in unexpected times & his arrival is unpredictable. He comes, disturbs the rhythm of life & goes away.
He comes back again and does the same thing & he is gone again. He never stays permanent, he is like an unwanted guest.
It is very common to get angry in our daily routine. The intensity of the anger can be different, sometimes it is very less, and sometimes it is very high.
No matter what the problem, No matter how much intensity, the question is how we react to it. Our reaction will decide the future consequences, either the problem can fade away with the right reaction or it can result in disaster.
We will look into some methods that will change your reaction to Anger.
Contents
- Conscious Approach
- Do Something Different
- Apply a New Solution
- Watch the Anger
- Take Action Immediately
- Do not suppress but express
- Conclusion
Conscious Approach
There are two approaches to doing anything in life. One is the conscious approach & another is the unconscious approach.
In our daily routine, we are mostly unconscious about what we are doing. In the unconscious approach, things happen robotically & the reactions are mostly the same every time. Unconscious is the sleepy approach & nothing will change with this kind of approach.
Conscious approach is the awake approach, a person is aware of what he is doing. His reaction becomes spontaneous & it is not robotic. He is not reacting based on the past but he reacts based on his present moment awareness.
Conscious approach brings to attention many things that used to remain unnoticed. And it will give a clarity of mind, dissolving the unnecessary anger caused due to ignorance or false interpretations.
The first step towards anger is to be conscious & to be aware that anger is arising. Its arrival should be consciously accepted & looked into. We are just becoming aware of the coming anger.
This is the beginning of the conscious approach. Initially nothing will change by getting conscious but as one follows this for months, he will be able to see some shift within his mind that will work like magic.
Do Something Different
To break the old patterns of living, we have to do something different so that we can get different results. Reacting the same old way will give the same old results.
Your patterns of reaction to the anger have deeply rooted within your mind. Taking another route will require conscious steps for building new patterns of reaction.
When you see yourself entering the door of anger, try doing something different this time. It may be anything but refuse to stick to the old patterns of reaction.
This time you are claiming your power over anger & are acknowledging your strength of changing the situation by your will.
Things happening to us are not predictable but choosing to react is absolutely in our control.
Some of the ideas that you can try doing different :
- Take deep & slow breaths.
- Hold your breaths for a few seconds.
- Recite affirmations to calm yourself.
- Do acupressure by pinching the top fingers with your thumb’s nail, this will release the tension in the muscles.
- Take a walk & talk to yourself about the situation.
- Think about why the other person reacted in a way that made you angry. Maybe the person was himself in pain.
- Do some exercise, like pushups, jumping, pull ups, running, etc.
- Listen to music, watch some motivational audio.
- Write on a paper or on a computer, all that is going in your mind as it is.
- Share your problem with someone else.
The above mentioned are just ideas to start with & there can be so many new ways to explore. Choose the way that best suits you & best suits the situation.
If you are in office, you cannot do pushups or exercise so this time you choose to do some other method. It may be any method but the point here is to start doing something different than you were not doing before.
Apply a New Solution
There is always a solution available, it is just the matter of finding it.
One who finds the solution early gets released from the unpredictable results that may have occurred in absence of solution.
It commonly happens that when a problem comes, we try a solution & it doesn’t work. We try again the same solution & there is no change. After sometime we still try the same thing but we fail again.
Trying the same solution isn’t the solution. We have to erase the solutions that are not working & find new solutions that will make the difference.
We can learn from the past solutions that have not worked but we cannot stick to them expecting the outcome. If we stick to the same solutions that aren’t working then they will increase the intensity of anger & this will be a never ending loop.
Think about the new possible solutions, design a new plan to tackle the problem & start it all fresh. Apply a new solution this time, change the strategy, change the mindset & there will be new results in life.
Anger will transform into a learning process & it will be filled with sharpening creative faculties of mind.
Doing something new will also keep the mind active & alive generating new energy levels in the mind. Anger is dis-alignment of energy & it cannot exist if the mind is flooded with boosted balanced energy levels.
There will be excitement & the mind will be shifted towards the positive flow of energy. The positive flow of energy will dissolve the burning anger & there will be satisfaction.
Watch the Anger
When the anger comes, we react to it with some kind of action or inaction. Anger triggers something within us that forces us to react in abnormal manner.
Anger changes the complete chemistry of our body for a few moments. All the body parts are affected & the muscles tighten up. When the anger jumps in, we are not aware of what is happening to our body & mind.
Watching the anger means driving our attention to the body & mind & watch exactly what happens at the moments of anger. When anger comes in, we need to be completely aware & watch its existence.
Just like a commentator in a cricket match, describes exactly the happening of the events in front of him. In a similar way, let the anger play in, we just watch the drama & see the specific details with awareness.
So what exactly happens in an angry state of mind? Below are some points of observation :
- Does the breath become faster?
- Does the blinking of the eye become faster?
- Are the teeth affected & tightened up?
- Are the legs affected & tightened up?
- Are the hands changing their posture?
- Is some body part trembling?
- Are you talking to yourself loudly?
- Are the thoughts coming at a faster rate than usual?
- Is there a gap between two thoughts?
- Keep attention on what your next thought is going to be.
Taking a scientific approach towards the Anger can possibly dissolve the anger because it is just a robotic reaction that occurs in certain situations.
Watching works like magic & no one can believe till they experience it by themselves that a simple act of observation can melt the anger.
This is also related to a spiritual approach taught by the enlightened masters. They teach their disciples to only watch the anger like someone watching from far hills.
Becoming an observer of the anger separates you from the anger because the observer is different & what is being observed is different.
Take Action Immediately
Some of the problems need immediate action otherwise they will expand causing the fire of anger to spread within our mind.
If there are 2 persons facing the same problem, one performs no action he waits in expectation of something magical. Another person takes immediate action & the result is that he gets released from the anger very quickly.
Smart people are the ones who have a smart approach towards the problems.
They do not delay, they do not procrastinate for the future, and they take immediate action.
It is just as if something is burning in front of you then you cannot wait, you bring in the water immediately to blow out the fire. Delaying it will spread the fire & it will cause more things to be burnt.
Delaying the action will keep the problem troubling you from some corner of mind. Anger will keep knocking from within because it needs a resolution to release the energy that has been accumulated.
Your ignorance towards the problem will not help but increase the problem. Instead of burning one object in the house, ignorance may burn the whole house.
Next time, when you find yourself getting angrier because of some problem, take action immediately. See what you can do on an immediate basis to fix the problem.
There is always a way out of everything. Keep firing the arrows of solution till it hits the target. Try different solutions one after another till you reach a solution that resolves the problem.
Do not suppress but express
Suppressing means hiding the anger within the mind. In some cases, a person acts as if he is not angry but within his mind he is very much angry.
He is disturbed from within but he is trying to hide the disturbance & show something which he is not.
It happens sometimes that when a problem comes making one angry but the person acts as if nothing has happened. He is feeling the anger but suppressing it within his heart.
Suppressing the anger causes the negative energies to be blocked in the body. Accumulated negativities if not released may cause physical or mental disorders.
In suppression, Person remains disturbed from within for a long time causing damage to the cellular system because the energy isn’t flowing freely within the body. In the spiritual terminologies, the chakras within the astral body get filled with negative energy.
It is necessary that the feelings of anger have to be surfaced & expressed. It doesn’t mean that you have to take any harsh action immediately. It means you throw out the feelings in a balanced manner so that anger can be released.
In some situations, if it is not possible to express the anger in front of the person then you can get aside alone & express it with some other methods like talking to yourself a little louder in alone place or something like punching the pillow.
Conclusion
Following a conscious approach towards the anger, will result in some new results because the old unconscious patterns will sway away with new conscious patterns.
Average people stick to the unconscious approach resulting in no changes in their lives. To make a change, one has to change the route, one has to do something different than what he was doing previously.
Techniques outlined in this blog can help you immensely in your personal as well as social life. They can open new pathways in your life because you are transforming your anger & this isn’t a small thing.
Bypassing the gate of anger will lead you to a life you never imagined possible.