Outbursts of anger can negatively affect different areas of our lives. Personal relationships deteriorate or break down and work relationships can be affected and compromise our employment. In addition, outbursts of anger make situations worse, prevent proper communication, encourage aggression and can affect our physical and mental health. That is why in Psychology-Online we explain why they occur and how to control anger outbursts.
Anger is an emotion normal that is adaptive in that it warns us that they are attacking our integrity, violating our rights or failing to satisfy our needs. However, when it takes over us or is disproportionate to the damage suffered, we suffer a fit of anger.
These outbursts of anger are harmful to ourselves and to our environment. Not only do they deteriorate social relationships, with all that that entails, but it also affects our mental health and usually physical health as well.
In the following article you will find more information about anger.
As we mentioned, anger appears
- “I must do things right and earn the approval of others. Otherwise, I am bad. " This belief often leads to anxiety, depression, shame, and guilt.
- “Others should treat me well. They must be kind and fair to me. They must treat me as I want. Otherwise, they are bad and deserve punishment. " This belief leads to anger, passive aggression, and violence.
- “The world must give me what I want and not what I don't want. If not, it's terrible and I can't bear it. " This belief leads to procrastination.
Understand that it is not possible to be perfect or demand that others be perfect, that we cannot please everyone and that things will not always turn out the way we would like; It is the first step in responding adaptively and decreasing anger outbursts.
To learn to control our anger effectively and in the long term we will work on our thoughts, since are the cause of disproportionate reactions and it is in our hands to change them for other rational ones and adaptive.
The Rational Emotional Behavioral Therapy (RETT) by Albert Ellis provides excellent results. This technique proposes that an event (A) activates our thoughts or beliefs (B) that cause our emotions or behaviors (C). In other words, it is not the event (A) in which it causes the emotions and behaviors (C), but rather our thoughts or beliefs (B) are the cause. And these thoughts and beliefs (B) can be modified.
The most common thoughts associated with irrational beliefs that generate our anger are:
- Qualify a situation as terrible. Ex: "It's terrible that this happened to me."
- Thinking that someone or something should be different from what it is. Ex: “I shouldn't have done that”, “I shouldn't have acted that way”.
- Thinking that what happened is unbearable or intolerable. Eg: “it is intolerable that they treat me like this”, “I can't stand that situation”.
- Generalize and label someone for a specific fact. Eg: "She has acted badly, so she is a bad person and must be punished."
Once we identify irrational thoughts or beliefs, we must analyze if they are as true as we believe. Here you will find more information about the irrational ideas discussion technique. Then we will replace them with other more real and beneficial thoughts.
Little by little and with practice we will be able to modify those thoughts and we will have the necessary ability to calm down and react to an imminent outburst of anger. We will finally know how to manage our anger.
Other ideas for managing anger:
- Practice relaxation to reduce our activation in the face of an outburst of anger.
- Use humor to downplay the situation that generates anger.
- Practice changing your thoughts and relaxation by exposing ourselves to situations that provoke anger.
- Accept ourselves It will give us security and it will also help us not to be affected so much by events that we do not like. The following article explains how to build self love.
- Time out. Get out of the situation that causes us anger, to reduce our activation, when this is possible.
The most important and at the same time the most difficult thing in the face of a minor's outburst of anger is keep calm. Boys and girls learn by imitation. In addition, if we get angry or aggressive, we will favor the tantrum.
When the child calms down, we will try to talk to him or her. We will ask what caused your anger and how you felt during and after the outburst. We must use words appropriate to their age.
Knowing what caused your anger will allow us to teach you alternative solutions that will make you feel better if a similar situation arises. Reinforcing acceptable behaviors maintains them.
This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
