From The Daily Dialogue
From The Daily Dialogue
Broadcast of 7/14/98
Subject: [DailyDialogue 193] Expressing Anger
Expressing anger is not always the best way to deal with it. In expressing anger, we might be practicing or rehearsing it, and making it stronger in the depth of our consciousness. Expressing anger to the person we are angry at can cause a lot of damage.
-- Tich Nhat Hanh
Expressing anger safely has a long history. Many angry people have gotten some relief (without harming anyone) by punching a bag or chopping woodd. Nowadays it's more fashionable to run or work out at the exercise facility. These ways of dealing with anger probably qualify as symptom relief.
While acting out anger in therapy might help a depressed person, it is not considered therapeutic to encourage angry people to express their anger.
In dialogue, we try to distinguish between expressing anger and talking about anger. We discourage the expressing or acting out of anger. We encourage each other to talk about our anger and teach mirroring the partner's angry content. People who are angry usually have a good reason for their anger, and it helps to state that in response to your partner's expression of anger. For example, my partner might say, "It makes sense that you were angry when the other driver cut you off at the intersection. I imagine you also realized how close we came to getting in a serious accident."
Experiment: Dialogue about messages that you have received that make it more difficult for you to say I'm feeling angry about …
Affirmation: We share our feelings by communicating deftly about them.
The Daily Dialogue is published each day of 1998 by e-mail. Copyright 1998, Eddy Brame and Marty Crouch, All rights reserved.
