Let It Go
Being Emotional Intelligent With Anger Is All Right
While reviewing a very sharp book called Letting Go of Anger by Ron Potter-Efron, M.S.W. & Pat Potter-Efron, M.S., I was prompted to write about how some of the anger styles in this reading resonated very well with me. Anger avoidance takes a heavy toll on your personal well-being. I can remember experiencing hiding my anger to the point of possibly suppressing it. Gosh, if I had not avoided my anger in my past years ago in my life; I would have been destructive, abusive, and explosive every day! I traveled a very lonely and depressed road after losing my parents many years ago. I survived by avoiding my anger of all the unwanted drama that I encountered in my youthful days. Just as the author says, ‘anger is part of all human beings.” We are not complete without it. Anger avoiders often get depressed, not only because depression is “anger turned inward” (actually, we think self -hatred is a term for that kind of anger), but mostly because most anger avoiders feel so helpless and hopeless. Without anger, they cannot get what they want or do what they need to do. That is when they get depressed. Anyone would if they were too afraid of their anger to use it well.
I will share more on this topic of anger but let me repeat Charles Rumberg “Feel the feeling. Choose the behavior.”
There is hope and help for the anger avoiders. There are four main ideas to learn and accept:
