Anger and the Mind In Turmoil

I think the two primary reasons why people seek help regarding their Anger are, first, Anger gets them into Professional, Social and Family Trouble; and secondly, people HATE the Aftermath of Anger – the Thinking Thinking Thinking – the Mental Turmoil that doesn’t seem to let up.

Everyone here knows that our relatively New Member, Osenych, has published a book (Anger Management… by Olga Senych; available from that Big On Line Book Retailer), and a section in her book deals with this issue of Angry Thoughts.

But hers is a short intro book on Anger Management and we can’t expect that she would exhaust everything there would possibly be to say on any particular subject, and so I feel I could expand a bit on the topic a bit without stepping on her toes.

Now, Much of What One Thinks After an Angry Encounter qualifies under the category of things “I should have said” – smart come-backs, and sarcasm often come to mind. Since I started Studying Anger Management, it has become one of my firm beliefs that ‘Thank God I Didn’t Say Any of That “I Should Have Said” stuff’. Smart Come-backs and Sarcasm would almost certainly have made the Situation worse. When Angry, the less one says, the better. Also, with the Less One Says, there is also Less To Think About Afterwards.

Our Thinking Replays the Situation again and again, as we build up a kind of a Narrative Commentary to it. It is really hard to concentrate on anything else. You know, if I was a Manager on a Factory Floor and several of the Workers had a heated argument. Well, yes, let them cool down. But, how long does that take? Honestly speaking, both workers are ‘done for the day’… having them around, with them so out of focus is perhaps a Quality Issue, and may have Safety Implications – I would send them home, even if on Comp Time (and with advice to seek Anger Management Therapy!).

Then I remember thinking ‘What is the Survival Value in all of this Thinking Thinking Thinking that comes after an Anger Episode?” I couldn’t help but to think that it must be Very Good for Language Skills, as the Repeated Narrative and Mental Commentary and all of the “Should Have Saids” help to fill out with actual Words what we are thinking, and helps us to Know What we are Thinking, and in great detail. It is our Mind bubbling and percolating up and we get a good chance to look at it, and It has a good chance to exercise itself and stretch its muscles a bit. But here it is Extremely Important to Monitor the Thinking with an eye toward Filtering Out what is obviously Dysfunctional and Counterproductive. Instead of stirring up Hate and Revenge, one could redirect to “I should be Thinking About Damage Control About Now”… and of course the Thoughts seem to have a Life of their own and seem to want to scurry back towards Hate and Revenge, but we are still able to Jump Back In and Redirect in certain moments when we are a bit more Lucid.

I forget the Author who presented this one very good Analogy for these Tumultuous Thoughts – he called it the “Leaky Bucket”. The Thoughts naturally die down in time, like water leaking out of a Leaky Bucket. If you don’t Do Anything to refill the Bucket, you will eventually get your Peace of Mind back.

But even with all the Good Advice from the Books, there doesn’t seem to be Much of a Short Cut about the Aftermath of Anger and that Dark Cloud of Thoughts that engulfs one. It is A Lot better after the first night’s sleep, if you can fall asleep! But the mind is still troubled, sometimes going all the way into Day 3.

The Best Advice is to Avoid these kind of Angry Confrontations in the First Place. Also, I have a feeling that the Intensity of an Angry Confrontation is boosted by Adrenaline. If one can Catch and Stop an Adrenaline Rush before it hits its Peak (which I have written about before), then one may be doing a lot to preserve one’s Peace of Mind for the Next Three Days… or at least from having a completely horrible ‘the rest of the day’ and a bad night’s sleep.

Oh, and the Problem doesn’t have to be your own thinking… I have been in relationships where my ‘Significant Other’ got angry, and whether justified or not, I would feel demoralized by it because I KNEW that for the next 3 days she would be in some Dark Gloomy Funk. Of course I seldom handled it very well… and often made it Worse by making true but counterproductive statements such as, “Oh, you really had that get THAT off your chest, Didn’t You? And you’ll feel So Much Better Now, Won’t You? … for the Next Three Days I guess it will be nothing but Goodness and Light around here…”

People talk about how important it is to be Assertive. But it requires such great Social and Communications Skills not seem like you are just Complaining and trying to Start an Argument. How often does being Assertive break down into an Angry Back and Forth? Yes, YOU might be able to keep your cool, but what if you only succeed in Upsetting the Person who you were trying to have that Heart to Heart with? We need to Practice Risk Benefit Assessments on the things we plan to say to people. Before we Say Anything that amounts to a Suggestion or Comment to or about somebody else, we need to think about How Easily It Could All Go Wrong, and cause the Start of a Miserable Three Days of Mental Anguish. And what did we hope to gain? Is what we hoped to gain worth all that? Especially in Work Related Situations? Remember, nobody pays you any more for sharing all your wonderful Ideas with Co-workers and with the Boss, but all that kind of Talk can stir up Office Politics, and we should all know by now how easy it is to be a Loser with Politics. You will find in most cases that you can’t go wrong with ‘Silence is Golden’.