Anger, has applications to WW

[Moses Yoder]

I am studying anger as it applies to relationships. Everyone gets angry. Lets say you are ripping on the TS and a piece kicks back; a normal person reacts with some fear and then anger; fear is an emotion that drives anger. In this situation most people are angry at themselves. Lets say you just finished turning a walnut burl bowl and a friend came into the shop and saw it. He or she picks it up to look at it and accidentally drops it on the cement floor and it breaks into smithereens. Most people would get angry at their friend.

If you have found good methods of controlling anger and reacting to it, I would be very interested in hearing them.

[Myk Rian]

I don't get angry. I get even.

Seriously though, I had a kickback. Didn't get angry. Just didn't do what I did again.

[whit richardson]

Some good not new advice... a) walk away from the source if possible. distance between anger object and self. b) take 5 to 10 deep breaths (from the abdomen not chest breathing), slows down the heart rate and lowers the adrenaline and then there's c) go ahead throw something you'll feel better!

[Jim Koepke]

If you have found good methods of controlling anger and reacting to it, I would be very interested in hearing them.

+1 on this!

After almost 60 years of living in the San Francisco area we moved to a more rural area. We are now about 10 miles from the nearest traffic signal. A little further to the nearest store.

It has helped me to be much more calm.

jtk

[Kent A Bathurst]

Simply walk away from the situation. Come back later.

If the right answer is to go nuclear, then it will still be the right answer tomorrow, and you have not eliminated your options.

[Roy Harding]

There's nothing wrong with anger. It's unCONTROLLED anger that'll get you into trouble. You're right that often (usually?) fear is what causes anger - you need to understand what caused the fear, analyze it, and control it. That process can take milliseconds in some circumstances, minutes in others, and years in some. Once you've analyzed the fear (and understood how to handle it), you'll understand the anger, and then you can control it.

To react angrily is usually a mistake - especially when woodworking.

[Mel Fulks]

I find the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius helpful.

[Larry Edgerton]

No anger here. I have a block wall in my shop just for that purpose.

I cruise yard sales just so I can buy cheap tools to throw at the block wall when thing go South! :p

Just kidding, but it is an idea......

[Ryan Mooney]

I find the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius helpful.

More of a "book of five rings" guy myself but the principal is, I believe, similar :D

[Brett Luna]

If the right answer is to go nuclear, then it will still be the right answer tomorrow, and you have not eliminated your options.

"I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

More seriously, I don't often get too angry in the shop. When I do, swearing a blue streak for a minute usually relieves dangerous pressure levels sufficiently.

[DOUG ANGEL]

Stop what you are doing, take several deep breaths, calm down. If that doesn't work, take a walk for at least 10 minuets. That always calms me down enough to be rational. Rational people can solve problems either personal or technical. If you can't get results after all this, NUKE 'EM.

[Dave Zellers]

Anger is usually an indulgence. We always have at least 2 choices, walk away/shrug it off, or get angry. There are certainly times when getting angry serves a useful purpose, but they are few and far between.

[Shawn Pixley]

I used to have an anger problem. Between a few traumatic events and some concious work on my part, I don't usully get too angry over things / material objects. I can still get angry when something or someone threatens those who I consider my family (biologic and those who we "adopt").

More practically, if a friend dropped one of my turnings on the floor, I am sure that they would be equally unhappy. I feel confident they would at a minimum offer to get me a new piece of burl. Those that wouldn't do that, wouldn't be my friends and thusly not in my shop.

In he orginal situation described, I'd like to think that I would be temporarily unhappy, and then I would move on. I have chosen the way I want to live my life. Being angry about things, is not in that construct. Life is too short to live angry over small things all the time. Others seem surprised at my current zen demeanor.

[Andrew Hughes]

I was in a meeting once and guy shared the when he got pissed off angry he file the point off of a nail or cut some metal with a hack saw.I thought that was a interesting outlet.
Myself I just stuff my feeling.Thats what I do since I can remember according to my inventorys I'm also a passive aggressive.Aj

[Justin Ludwig]

I read "A New Earth" by Eckhart Tolle in 2007 when I went through a divorce. The book "found" me, as it was sitting on my Mom's coffee table as part of her "Oprah book club" stack. It's full of a bunch of hippie philosophical mumbo jumbo "live and let live" type of advice. There are some great adages and metaphors in it that I still reference today. It helps with anger management. It may sound like I'm making fun at the book, but it was a tremendous help.

My old Navy roommate and best friend went through a very tough divorce in 2010 because his kids were moving to Norway as a result. I referred the book to him and he said it helped him as well. My wife read it and said, "Meh", with a shoulder shrug. :rolleyes:

Good luck.

I'll add this. I don't let things stew. If somethings bothers me, I deal with it ASAP (both personally and professionally). I don't like having 1-sided conversations in my head where I always win. It's detrimental to do that. Address the issue, open-minded, with the person you have problems.

[Chuck Wintle]

My take on anger is that the angry person usually is owned or defined by his/her angry actions. I believe there is usually another path that can be used instead of angry actions or words.

[Jay Jolliffe]

Myself I just stuff my feeling.That's what I do since I can remember according to my inventory's I'm also a passive aggressive.Aj

I've done this also my whole life. Stuff feelings inside. There must be a huge hole where they go. I stuffed until my wife got cancer then the anger came out & I wanted to smash things & hurt someone. That's not me. I didn't smash or hurt anyone but those feelings lasted for weeks until my wife went & I went to the hospital & we talked to the doctors...Then the feeling's just seemed to get stuffed like always. At one point in my life it got scary as I didn't have feeling's for me & my kids. Didn't care if I lived or died. That's when I decided to talk to someone & that lasted for two yrs....That was twenty or so yrs ago & today I still stuff feelings...Hard to teach an old dog new tricks I guess

[Scott Shepherd]

No one "makes" you angry except yourself. If you allow other people to make you angry, then you are giving them control over you. If someone knows that pushing your buttons makes you come unhinged, and you allow them to do that, then they have controlled you and made you react. In my opinion, you have given them a tremendous amount of control over your life. Now, if you let them do that, then that's on you, not them. You make the decision to let someone have that much control over you.

Imagine that same person, trying to push your buttons and not seeing the reaction they were expecting. Think they'll get the payoff they were looking for? Nope. When it stops paying off for them, they'll stop trying to make you angry as well.

Once you understand that it's your choice to get angry, not someone's else's choice to get you angry, and that lightbulb moment happens about it, it'll change your life.

[ken masoumi]

Stuff feelings inside. There must be a huge hole where they go. I stuffed until my wife got cancer then the anger came out & I wanted to smash things & hurt someone. That's not me. I didn't smash or hurt anyone but those feelings lasted for weeks until my wife went & I went to the hospital & we talked to the doctors...Then the feeling's just seemed to get stuffed like always


Anger is usually an indulgence. We always have at least 2 choices, walk away/shrug it off, or get angry. There are certainly times when getting angry serves a useful purpose, but they are few and far between.

If I feel I'm intentionally being mistreated ,I have learned(as I'm getting older ) that shrugging it off and walking away makes me feel more in control and therefore "better" but when I was young my reaction was always to confront.
But ,what if your anger is as a result of events you have no control over?,when that happens ,some say it can be self destructive if anger is not expressed,I don't know how true that is but I keep that angry reaction,(like Jay) inside, all bottled up.

[Larry Edgerton]

No one "makes" you angry except yourself. ..

Not so sure about that Scott. I generally feel that way, but a few years ago I got stuck on a house for $156K, and it was an intentional swindle with no real recourse. I was angry and it took every thing I could muster not to end up in prison. I carried that anger for a long time, and it made a change in the way I think about my business that I still deal with any new customer. I no longer love my job, and that is the worst thing he stole from me.

When I was younger I had a temper, a learned response that I picked up from my father. After 58 years I think I just about have it licked......

[Scott Shepherd]

Not so sure about that Scott. I generally feel that way, but a few years ago I got stuck on a house for $156K, and it was an intentional swindle with no real recourse. I was angry and it took every thing I could muster not to end up in prison. I carried that anger for a long time, and it made a change in the way I think about my business that I still deal with any new customer. I no longer love my job, and that is the worst thing he stole from me.

When I was younger I had a temper, a learned response that I picked up from my father. After 58 years I think I just about have it licked......

Did being angry get you your money back? Nope. So you chose to be angry and it almost got you in prison. You had 2 paths to go by, stay calm and work through the issues, or get angry and work through the issues. You picked angry. Didn't change the end result, but it caused you a lot of issues along the way. That's my point, that's a decision you made, not one someone made for you.

[Kent A Bathurst]

No one "makes" you angry except yourself.

You have never met my little sister.

[Moses Yoder]

What I have been told is that it is other emotions that drive anger. I find it interesting the ones that say they bury their anger, or stuff it. I have been told that is why I have problems in relationships; I don't feel my emotions. It is not really important to feel the anger, it is important to figure out what emotion is driving the anger. I am not going to discuss it much further here, there is a lot of good info already for me to pursue. I especially like the suggestions for reading material. Thank you.

[Larry Edgerton]

Did being angry get you your money back? Nope. So you chose to be angry and it almost got you in prison. You had 2 paths to go by, stay calm and work through the issues, or get angry and work through the issues. You picked angry. Didn't change the end result, but it caused you a lot of issues along the way. That's my point, that's a decision you made, not one someone made for you.

If you can have that much money stolen from you and not get angry you are a better man than me. I had to sell my 56 Suburban and my 65 GTO to pay my suppliers. I still get a twitch when I see them drive by.

[Moses Yoder]

If you can have that much money stolen from you and not get angry you are a better man than me. I had to sell my 56 Suburban and my 65 GTO to pay my suppliers. I still get a twitch when I see them drive by.

I think everyone gets angry; the difference is in how we react to the anger, how long the anger lasts, and how it affects our relationships. For instance if you had reacted in such a way that you went to prison, your relationship with your wife would have been affected directly. I think the choice is in how we react to our anger, which is really what I am searching for; appropriate and proper responses to anger. In most cases I think the appropriate response is to somehow calm ourselves down to eliminate the anger so we can deal with the situation logically.

[Judson Green]

Life is too short to live angry over small things all the time. Others seem surprised at my current zen demeanor.


True indeed!

I find its hard work to be angry and not worth it. Be down in the dumps however is another story - can be easy to get there and difficult to get out of.

[Shawn Pixley]

True indeed!

I find its hard work to be angry and not worth it. Be down in the dumps however is another story - can be easy to get there and difficult to get out of.

Anger, I have made peace with. Depression, much harder for me. A cynic is an idealist who's been disappointed one to many times.

['Jacques Malan']

II think the choice is in how we react to our anger, which is really what I am searching for; .

Maybe this will help (http://www.bakadesuyo.com/2015/04/frustrated/?utm_source=%22Barking+Up+The+Wrong+Tree%22+Weekly +Newsletter&utm_campaign=9ac7d462a6-frustrated_04_5_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_78d4c08a64-9ac7d462a6-57050257).

I used to throw things around and curse. It was not nice.

At the beginning of last year I did a Whole30 challenge, eating clean and healthy for 30 days, and I continued eating cleanish afterwards. .My outbursts stopped. I still get upset, but not to that level.

[Chuck Hart]

As someone wrote earlier anger is a indulgence. Attitude is a choice. Each event that we experience comes to us through that choice filter. It is unfortunate that I can't see things without that filter. Many things used to anger me now I see things differently and I am a lot less angry. Except when I do something stupid in the shop.

[John Sanford]

There's nothing wrong with anger. It may or may not be a byproduct of fear. What it is is a call to action.

Take action. Whether that action is to change what you're doing, stop what you're doing, do something different, or start doing something, take action.

Just keep this in mind:

"In your anger, do not sin."

[Jim Rimmer]

I'm not always successful but before I do something because of my anger I try to ask myself, "One year from now, what difference will all this make?"

[Jason Roehl]

There's nothing wrong with anger. It may or may not be a byproduct of fear. What it is is a call to action.

Take action. Whether that action is to change what you're doing, stop what you're doing, do something different, or start doing something, take action.

Just keep this in mind:

"In your anger, do not sin."

I like this answer. Anger is a natural emotion. Whether or not we get angry is often irrelevant. What IS relevant is how we react to that anger. If you normally react with an outburst of some sort, you are going to have to practice reacting consistently in a different, calmer, better way. I think it's very similar to how many people freeze when they are filled with fear--it's something that through practice can be overcome (the military certainly tries to practice overcoming fear). The key is to mentally prepare yourself: "The next time I am angry, I am going to..." Think on that from time to time so that when the time comes you have a shot at a different reaction than a violent outburst.

I'm still a work in progress myself. Overall, I'm much better than I used to be. One thing that helped is an event that showed me the foolishness of a violent reaction. When I was 18 or so, my mother and I had an argument (not very common), and when I stormed off, I went into my bedroom, which was spotless, save for the plastic wastebasket sitting in the center of the room. When I stomped into the room, I saw that wastebasket, and I punted it with everything I was worth. We're talking 80-yard-field-goal-type-of-punt. The wastebasket split down the side and stuck to my foot instead of going through the basement wall as I certainly intended. Looking back, it's pretty funny, really.

Another part of it is that you need to recognize when you're so stressed that one little thing will set you off. My life is largely stress-free now, so it's much easier to take things that anger me in stride.

I would say bottling up your anger only works in the short term--you'll soon need to do something to relieve the pressure. I don't think it's necessarily bad to hold it back, as long as you soon do something to let it out (hard physical labor or exercise go a long way toward that for me).

I hope you figure things out, Moses.

[Jim Andrew]

When I was young, I had anger issues. And it was immediate. Now that I am older, I just choose not to be angry. Sometimes, someone tries to provoke me, but I just do not take the bait.

[Belinda Barfield]

Chiming in from the female side, which some consider to be more emotional, and using every psychobabble cliche I can remember, here goes . . .
I am a "pleaser". I prefer to travel, shop, vacation, whatever, by myself so I can do the things that I want to do. Some consider that selfish, but if I do things with another person I always defer to their choices and sacrifice mine.
I believe I get more frustrated than angry, and I take those frustrations and put them in a mental closet. For example, if I ask my better half for help with something, that means I need help at the time, not an hour later, or two hours later. Then we have the conversation that starts with "you expect me to jump when you say jump!", and I reply with "if I didn't need help at the time I wouldn't have asked for it". At some point the mental closet can't hold everything and door rips open and those frustrations explode all over. Then I get the "Why did you suddenly blow up over nothing?" My mother does the same thing. I find that throwing things really helps, but I try to refrain from that action. Taking a walk helps as well, and is much safer for my belongings.
And speaking of relationships, I am a "passionate" person. I love or hate things. I find things to be beautiful, or amazing, or tremendous - any over the top descriptive works. My better half, on the other hand, had serious anger issues when younger and learned to control his anger (somewhat). In the process, as another poster stated, he tamped down other emotions as well. He doesn't allow himself to feel much at all. In a bizarre turn of affairs though, he is the eternal optimist. I, on the other hand, am the eternal realist (he says pessimist). We are buying a new home and stopped by yesterday to discuss where to put what. After an hour of discussion, and a possible agreement, I remarked that everything would change again once he thought about it. That lead to his comment that I always see the worst in things, but in reality I know that he is incapable of making a decision without rethinking it 27 times.
Having said all of that, I feel much better! I will follow this thread in hopes that I might learn some new techniques for anger control. Deep breathing just doesn't work for me, and I can't always go for a walk at work. For those of you who wonder why my entire post revolves around my better half, we live together, own businesses together, eat most meals together, and ride to and from work together most days. I don't interact with a lot of other people. Maybe that's my problem!

[Prashun Patel]

I'm always quicker to get angry in a situation when I'm in a bad, funky mood in general. These come and go in waves over time, and are a function of general dissatisfaction with something deeper in my life (work, kids, relationship).

When I'm not frustrated in general, I react to situations more productively and happily.

An ex-girlfriend once told me that love is not a feeling, it's a decision. I think the same for happiness. I'm trying to learn to just be happy with myself and all the wonderful things in my life. When I'm 'generally' happy, I find the situations take care of themselves. I was also told many years ago that my own energy is contagious (for better and worse). When I'm unhappy with things, it seems to infect the moods of the people around me, which is fuel for angry interactions.

I know the right answer for anger management is to walk away, count to ten, sleep on it, wait to react. But it's been very hard for me to stop the symptom. It's been more meaningful and manageable - albeit a longer term investment - to cure the cause.

[Prashun Patel]

Jim, that's a dumb thing to say... ;)

[Dave Zellers]

At some point the mental closet can't hold everything and door rips open and those frustrations explode all over. Then I get the "Why did you suddenly blow up over nothing?"
I very much enjoyed your post. I used to be a 'pleaser' as well, and to a degree I still am but not as much as when I was young.

I was moved to respond to your post, and quote the above, when I opened my fortune cookie tonight and it read: "Beware the fury of the patient man".

Seemed apropos and synchronistic.

Thus far it seems to me, any lesson this thread may have is that learning to control anger for many, happens over time, as we 'mature' (age).

But it all can also be summed up in two phrases:

"Don't sweat the small stuff"

and

"It's all small stuff"