When Anger Comes At Us

Sometimes the anger is ours. But there's another side of anger I've often had to deal with:
anger coming at me. Anger exploding from my father, when I was a child. And much harder for me, anger which I know will come at me if I say this or that, do this or that. Anger used - whether consciously or unconsciously - to control.

My first impulse has generally been to avoid the anger, not arouse it -
and so give in to the (unspoken) threat of it.

But in the end I've usually come, inside myself, to my father's kind of anger -
the kind that explodes out, no matter what I'd prefer. Blast.

Sometimes, like my father, I've felt bad about getting angry. Sometimes I've felt justified.
One way or the other, things haven't gotten resolved.

What might work?  How to deal with anger coming at us?

****

I have had so many thoughts about this, this past week. They went through my head,
all neat and organized, but have now been forgotten. I do remember a dream.
In it, I am at a meeting. A friend, one with a name very close to mine, is there...
And now I realize that the dream too is gone.

I ask myself: what is going on here? why am I forgetting so much?

I will start with the general thing I have been thinking about:
trying to get through the rage layer - someone else's rage layer.

Now the dream is coming back. My friend knows that someone, someone angry,
someone not with us, is possibly doing something dangerous.
I mildly put the meeting on hold, say go and take care of it. We will go on later.

****

The day before, in life, there had been a meeting - myself, my partner, and a couple of other people - one of them with a name similar to mine. I had tried to ignore my partner's quiet anger. I often face his anger. Before the meeting, I had tried to talk to him - not so much about the anger, as about my wanting to move faster on a project than he did, to bring in other people despite his not feeling ready. On my side, I felt held back - as if I was trying to drive with the brakes rigidly on. I was increasingly frustrated. Two months earlier, I had given in to his unwillingness. I was no longer prepared to do that. Everything in me said: time to move. The problem: since I did not want to to keep the project going at his pace, I knew there would be anger.

I didn't talk with him about his anger before the meeting. I remember deciding not to talk about it, actually. As far as I remember, I talked about everything else: our difference, my having let him have his way for two months, there being no way of having it both ways, his not having been concerned about me when he got his way, etc.

Waking up, the dream fresh in my mind, I was glad that, in the dream, I was not enraged. (In the dream, the anger wasn't even aimed at me, and not even at my friend with the name similar to mine.)

But importantly, in terms of how to deal with anger, what to do about anger:
The anger can not just be sidestepped.
And the anger is destructive.
My friend doesn't know what is being done -
but it is potentially very bad. It needs to be taken care of.

****

I think of suggestions from Robert Meyer's How to Get Your Loved One Sober.
Lots of helpful suggestions for getting to more of what one wants
and so lessening the storehouse of one's own anger:

• Tell your loved one how much you enjoy being around them sober.
• Plan an activity that you both enjoy and make it clear it's important that, for this activity, they're sober.
• Make alternative plans, in case they're not sober.
• If they're not, go ahead and have a good time doing your alternative activity.

That leaves out the possibility of the loved one's anger when one goes off
and does a fun activity on one's own. Also, it leaves out their possible blindness to -
their possible deep-rooted denial of - their anger.

****

I wish I could remember the incident I went over in my head during the past few days - an incident where I could not get through to my partner, where he stayed inside a shell of anger. As he saw it, he was right, I was wrong. Plus, he saw himself either as not angry, or as very justifiably angry. In other words, as he saw it, if he was angry, his anger was my fault - I deserved every bit of it.On top of that, he was sure he knew exactly what was going on in me, and what was going on in me was grounds for his anger (though in fact, as I told him without this making any difference, he was way off base in his assumption of what was going on in me).

I'm not sure why the incident is gone from my mind. Quite possibly it's because the story is personal - and on top of that, not just about me, but about someone else.

What readily comes to mind is something that is not personal, but similar - a public display of narcissistic rage (the technical term for rage that keeps out the outside world). The public example: the huge international Muslim outcry against a Danish cartoon many Muslims claim makes fun of their religion. The outcry ignores the many grossly insulting cartoons published in Muslim countries, and even more the many human rights violations committed by Muslims in the name of their religion in many Muslim countries, etc. Those who are enraged present the cartoon as such an enormous injury that all Danish products deserve to be banned and the whole West deserves to be raged against. (See The Rage of the "Righteous" for details).

The rage does not make sense if one is trying to see a reasonable response
to something only possibly offensive. It makes perfect sense
if the rage is being used, at least in part, to keep out reality,
and to try (by fear) to keep the outside world in line.

There I have lots of suggestions on how to deal with anger that is excessive to the stimulus - most of all, to recognize the anger as out of line with the impetus, and to speak about it (though one may very well not get through to those totally caught up in it). In general, I hold that the larger and more powerful the mirror is, reflecting the anger back as dangerous, excessive, inappropriate, the better.

But what about on the personal front?

I've looked at ways to diminish one's own storehouse of anger,
using tools from the book I've just mentioned.

****

Okay, so is there any way of using that approach?
In this case, how to deal with anger coming at us would mean:

• Suggest we do one thing, just one, which we both enjoy and with no rage.
• In case there is rage, make plans for something else.

It all sounds so easy.

But what if I come up against a wall of not-seeing, a layer of rage or anger? What if I can get more good times, but can't figure out a way of making inroads against the shell of anger?

And what if I want to do something where the response is sure to be anger?

Not easy, to deal with that.

For this, I have no suggested readings.

But your stories are welcome.

What have you done that has gotten through to the other,
when the other has used anger not to see something,
and has also used anger to get their way
(while denying they were doing this)?

What has worked to change things?

How to deal with anger coming at us? A big question.

To be continued.

signed,

Dr Zee
September 30, 2006

copyright © Elsa Schieder 2006, 2008 - all rights reserved
publishing house - FlufferDuff Impressions 2006, 2008

****

AN INVITATION:
YOUR COMMENTS, YOUR THOUGHTS
YOUR EXPERIENCES WITH HOW TO DEAL WITH ANGER

Click here for
Keeping the Love Light Burning -
by Lessening the Stockpile of Anger.

To go from How To Deal With Anger
to everything in Dr Zees LoveLine,
click here.

For more on the impact of anger,
here is The Rage of the Righteous,
and
and the potential impact of a powerful mirror
on the raging self-righteous.

Dr Zees LoveLine
"In love you could shine like a brilliant star."
Fortune Cookie

Big Questions. How To Deal With Anger? How To Control Anger?
Here: Ways To Control Anger Coming At Us.
The Goal: Letting Go Of Anger. What To Do About Anger?
No Easy Answer.

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DR ZEES LOVELINE on ANGER COMING AT US
how to deal with anger? how to control anger coming at us? ways to control anger directed at us?
anger managed * calming anger * anger wall * working with anger *
fighting anger * facing anger * love and anger * facing anger * love relationship problem *
what to do about anger * anger and you relationships * what to do about anger *
fighting anger * cause of anger * triggers of anger * aggressive anger * anger disorder *
how to deal with anger, anger outburst, anger addiction? * effects of anger * anger management *
DR ZEES LOVELINE

Dr Zees LoveLine

How To Deal With Anger?
Responding to Anger, When Anger Comes At Us - Not Easy.
The Anger Wall. What to do? Flee? Freeze? Fight? Fright? Rage?
Questions. Suggestions. Input welcome.

Dr Zees Loveline Explores Not Avoiding The anger,
But Not Exploding into Rage.

DR ZEES LOVELINE on ANGER COMING AT US
how to deal with anger? how to control anger? what to do about anger?
responding to anger, to anger addiction, to the anger wall, to triggers of anger *
ways to conrol anger - what is real and what is wishful thinking?
anger and you relationships * hurting others * loss grief sorrow *
anger managed * calming anger * anger wall * working with anger *
what to do about anger * fighting anger * facing anger * love and anger *
love relationship problem * anger and you relationships *
fear and anger * fear as weapon *anger as weapon *
DR ZEES LOVELINE

***SOCIALIZEIT***

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