Navigating Anger With Awareness

Anger is quite a consuming emotion and growing up, we were all taught to demonize and distance ourselves from it completely. While this may have helped some people control theirs, it made it worse for those who had a bad temper without an outlet to release it.

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I consider anger a valid emotion and strongly believe that people should be allowed to express and experience it the same way they do with every other feeling. However, I have made it my responsibility to draw a fine line between how high my anger can get and what situations justify it. Every time I see somebody get angry to the level of destruction, I try to remind myself that anger is something that can make me go from point A to point Z if not controlled carefully. Being conscious of this has helped me navigate my anger more intentionally.

I’m someone who doesn’t get angry easily, especially over things that are insignificant or do not require that level of emotion. I could get upset about something annoying someone did or said to me or my loved ones, but that feeling goes away in split seconds. On the other hand, when I’m angry, it’s usually for bigger reasons. For example, every day I am angry about the kind of dirty politics being played in my country because I know how deeply it affects my finances and the security of those I care about. I also realize how it destabilizes the average person who sometimes works two to three jobs just to stay afloat in a dwindling economy.

Hearing people around me make jokes about insensitive issues that affect real human beings also makes me very angry. Seeing a family member who is on the path of raising a docile child or being physically abusive makes my anger worse. Then imagine a situation where someone tries to control me, abuses my basic human rights or takes advantage of my kind nature. I would get really mad and this eventually leads to me to resenting such a person or institution because I'm aware that they have pushed me to my limit. When it’s any of these cases, I wouldn’t care if the person is a friend or an older adult when I react angrily because my senses would have already justified my anger, which mostly surfaces when I’ve ignored a lot from them.

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Whenever I get to the point of being extremely angry, I go on a full rant and say everything I feel without any care in the world. It is only after this that it begin to feel like a heavy weight has been lifted from my chest, and usually the next thing I do is sleep if I’m home. When I wake up, I realize that the anger I felt has died down but my awareness is what makes me see everything differently and keep my reservations about them intact. In most cases, I stop caring about the triggers of my anger. I eventually lose my soft spot or respect for them.

In all of this, I’m always thankful that I learned early not to let my anger get to the point where I destroy things with my hands or become physical with people in a bid to cause harm. Even more, I’m happy to know that I’m conscious of how high-tempered I could get, and still do my best to avoid people or things that trigger that side of me.

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