Anger Is Not Aggression

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Author: Oleg Chirkov

Anger is an emotion. Aggression is action.

Anger is what I feel. Aggression is what I do.

Feeling and doing are not the same thing. Moreover, for the same feeling, you can choose different actions.

You can be angry and not ashamed.

You can get angry and not scrape.

You can get angry and not hit.

The choice is always mine.

Generally speaking, there are many ways to get angry. For example, figuratively speaking, two options can be distinguished: “I am angry,” that is, it is larger than me; or when "anger is in me" and then I am more angry. Where there is “anger in me,” there can obviously be something else, which means there will be a place for other feelings, and then you can act not only out of anger, but also taking into account other experiences. Where "I am angry," nothing else can be noticed.

But the main thing is what I'm talking about now, and what turns out to be a novelty for many: it is possible to get angry, it is even useful. Aggression is a choice.

When I get irritated, frustrated, angry, angry, and even angry, I may or may not do a lot. And actions are my choice, for which I must be responsible.

It is very important to notice this distinction. Therefore, feelings appear before we have time to realize them. Actions are a completely different matter, they can be selected and carried out on the basis of their free, conscious choice. And this is also a choice. Refusal of choice, by the way, is also a choice, if that.

No one has ever died of anger. From its displacement, many psychological difficulties arise. Anger activates the body's forces to overcome, because it indicates a violation of boundaries, physical or psychological, or the meeting with obstacles on the way to what you want. You can react to this message in different ways:

1. "Explode", be overwhelmed by anger, absorbed by it and act out of affect, completely no longer controlling your actions.

2. Do not pour out your anger at once, accumulate it consciously in order to use it in a concentrated form where the energy of achievement is most important to me.

3. Use the energy of anger to mobilize your forces in order to repel an attack or attack an obstacle on your way to the task, including acting as an aggressor towards others.

4. Deny your anger, not notice it.

5. Notice your anger, but stop it because it is out of place in the here and now. Take her to a friend in a bar or to a psychotherapist session to deal with her in a calm state.

6. Expand anger at yourself, begin to reproach yourself for this feeling as unacceptable, to grow feelings of guilt and shame.

7. Notice your anger, say to yourself about it, for example - "I am angry" (often this alone may already be enough not to slip through the "space of free will" and be able to choose subsequent actions).

8. Noticing your anger, say what I am angry about to another in the form of an "I-message".

9. Noticing your anger, talk about it and conduct a dialogue, clarifying the feelings of the other, considering options for the development of events, choosing the most suitable for yourself, depending on the conversation.

10. Feel your anger in your body as an unfolding process. Give it the right to be, without the immediate need to react outside right now, to live it, exploring and when the peak subsides, realizing what it is, at whom and what it is aimed at, to act from the feeling of a “second wave”, and already choose what and how to do depending on the context, situation, intentions, experience and limitations.

This list can be supplemented, but already in this form, it shows that anger can be dealt with in different ways and actions, and therefore the consequences, both for oneself and others, in the end can also vary greatly. It is also clear that there is no single correct point. Even the first point can be useful, for example, in a situation where there is no other way out but to fight to the last, fighting for the life of yours or loved ones. Another question is how often this situation will be in life? And how often does it occur? But these are already questions for a deeper analysis. For now, I just want to say that anger is important, but further actions can be very different.

Anger, both one's own and that of others, is worthy of respect, acceptance and attention. She, along with other basic emotions, is necessary for survival and development. But anger is not aggression. Unfortunately, we do not allow ourselves to get angry because we are afraid of aggression, our own or someone else's. Because these concepts are often glued together in the mind. But anger and aggression are not the same thing. There can be a gap between stimulus and response. By revealing and allowing my anger to be, I expand this gap, allowing a space of choice to appear.

Then, noticing my anger, I can start to investigate it: what is it about? about what? for what? and choosing in the end does not have to be aggression. Withstanding and understanding my anger, I can withstand the anger of another, where I deem it necessary. For example, allowing, accepting, respecting the child's anger, his right to feelings, help him to better understand his anger (for example, draw or visualize it) by explaining how to deal with it. At the same time, analyzing which actions are acceptable, which are not, and which are being discussed. And what are the consequences, including responsibility.

This does not mean that there is no need to defend against the aggression of others. I am ready to withstand the anger of another as long as these are feelings, and not aggressive actions. Including from a child. The difference is very simple: feelings are what happens to a person, aggression is what he does, deliberately breaking the boundaries of another. Here the truth arises many different nuances. For example, who defines these boundaries and how? are they always obvious? There is a subject for more detailed discussions, for now I will only indicate that there are still generally accepted ideas and norms, sometimes culturally conditioned, so it is worth starting from them. Well, this is still a text focused on the application, first of all, to oneself. And in this sense, it is worth starting from your ideas.

Having discovered anger, you can make it the cornerstone of your relationship to another - since I'm angry with you, you are doing something wrong. Sometimes this can really be the case, if this other really violates my boundaries and then it is useful to fight back. But it is also useful to check "how exactly is this person violating my boundaries?" And it may turn out that a person does not violate the boundaries, but simply does not live up to my expectations, including due to the transfer of my fears, pain, despair from past experience to him. And then the roots of my anger are not in this person, but in the fact that I transfer uncovered situations from my past to him. The other is not actually obliged to live up to my expectations of him. And then my anger can tell me what to deal with in myself or in our relationship.

All this does not mean that aggression should always be avoided. It is sewn into the body at a biological level and is determined largely hormonally. But in humans, unlike animals, the level and attitude to aggression is also ethically regulated. Aggression can also be part of the game: in business, sports, sex. Here it is even necessary. An important condition, in fact, distinguishing healthy aggression from violence is the readiness, desire and consent to these rules of all parties involved. For one and the same action, you can get a lot of pleasure and a lot of money, or you can get a prison sentence - it depends on how much it was by agreement and within the framework of the law. This is if you exaggerate. And so, in life, of course, there are many places for aggression, even in the kitchen, even on the bus, the main thing is always a person's choice. It would be better to be aware of this. Although after watching the series "Chiki", for example, it is clear that this is not equally likely everywhere. For now.

But it's obvious to me that anger is inevitable. But aggression is optional.