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| Beyond Anger Management Techniques | Educational Resources | ||||||||||||||||||
The Real Causes For Anger and How We Can Eliminate (Not Just Manage) It In this article:
Anger is one of the most divisive and destructive forces on the planet. Anger
Many courses have been developed and books written for
the purpose of helping us manage and control our anger. There are extensive
anger management resources for mental health and anger management techniques
are a dime a dozen. But those have generally proven to be quite ineffective.
Anger still rages over the face of the earth like a consuming fire.
We need far more than anger management techniques or anger control.
We need to better understand the cause and nature of anger and thereby
gain the ability to eliminate it. Fortunately, in recent years we have
acquired an understanding of anger that has given us the ability to
do just that. Anger is an emotion so common among us that it has become like a background noise. We see it almost everywhere we look, so we scarcely notice it anymore. We’re angry
When we consider how often the above events occur, we realize that most of us are angry many times every day. A friend once said to me, “I don’t believe people are as angry as you think.” “Really?” I replied. “Walk into any Wal-Mart and cut in line.” People are either angry or they’re just a slight provocation away from anger. Anger is so common that it has come to be accepted as normal. And all the anger management techniques in the world will do us no good unless we understand the cause of anger. A NEW DEFINITION OF LOVE: REAL LOVE Because of the widespread incidence of anger, and the terrible effects it has everywhere it is found, we must understand the real cause of anger and thereby learn an approach to treating it that is much more productive than those we have been using to this point. You'll find that this simple definition is much more effective than all the anger management resources for mental health and anger management books on the shelves. Before we can really understand elimination of an emotional problem—like anger—we must first understand what leads to the creation and maintenance of emotional health. In short, we must understand what makes us happy, a subject that we have on the whole neglected sorely in favor of studying disease. In order to be happy, what we all require more than anything else is the feeling that we are loved. Our souls require feeling loved in just as real a way as our bodies require air and food. But not just any kind of love will do. The only kind of love that can fill us up and make us whole emotionally is Real Love. Real Love is caring about the happiness of another person without any thought for what we might get for ourselves. It’s also Real Love when other people care about our happiness unconditionally. With Real Love, people are not disappointed or angry when we make our foolish mistakes, when we don’t do what they want, or even when we inconvenience them personally. When I use the word happiness, I do not mean the brief and superficial pleasure that comes from money, sex, power, and the conditional approval we earn from others when we behave as they want. Nor do I mean the temporary feeling of satisfaction we experience in the absence of immediate conflict or disaster. Real happiness is not the feeling we get from being entertained or making people do what we want. It’s a profound and lasting sense of peace and fulfillment that deeply satisfies and enlarges the soul. It doesn’t go away when circumstances are difficult. It survives and even grows during hardship and struggle. True happiness is our entire reason to live, and it can only be obtained as we find Real Love and share it with others. With Real Love, nothing else matters; without it, nothing else is enough. Conditional Love Sadly, few of us have sufficiently received or given Real Love. From the time we were small children, we observed that when we didn’t fight with our sisters, didn’t make too much noise in the car, got good grades, and were otherwise obedient and cooperative, our parents and others smiled at us, patted our heads, and spoke kindly. With their words and behavior, they told us what good boys and girls we were, and we felt loved. But what happened when we did fight with our sisters, made too much noise, got bad grades, and dragged mud across the clean living room carpet? Did people smile at us then or speak gentle, loving words? No—they frowned, sighed with disappointment, and often spoke in harsh tones. Just as the positive behaviors of other people communicated to us that we were loved, we could interpret the withdrawal of those behaviors only as an indication that we were not being loved. Although it was unintentional, our parents and others taught us this terrible message: “When you’re good, I love you, but when you’re not, I don’t—or certainly I love you a great deal less.” This conditional love can give us brief moments of satisfaction, but we’re still left with a huge hole in our souls, because only Real Love can make us genuinely happy. When someone is genuinely concerned about our happiness, we feel connected to that person. We feel included in his or her life, and in that instant we are no longer alone. Each moment of unconditional acceptance creates a living thread to the person who accepts us, and these threads weave a powerful bond that fills us with a genuine and lasting happiness. Nothing but Real Love can do that. In addition, when we know that even one person loves us unconditionally, we feel a connection to everyone else. We feel included in the family of all mankind, of which that one person is a part. To learn more about where your anger comes from and how to replace it with peace and happiness, download a free chapter of Real Love and Freedom for the Soul: Eliminating the Chains of Victimhood. |
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How
to Eliminate Anger—Anger Management Techniques 
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