Instead of anger

Instead of anger, why not: Feel the frustration that led to it? Feel that hurt that led to it? Feel the disappointment underlying it?

Frustration, hurt and disappointment are three feelings in their own right, and are not always a good reason to become angry. They can simply be felt until they fade.

You see, anger is a secondary emotion, except when it's directly related to a strong injustice. But for most of us, most of the time, anger is a mask for some other primary emotion that we're in the habit of skipping over.

Speaking for myself, when I feel the most hurt, it's when someone hurts my child. That gets complicated when it's another of my children who inflicted the hurt. Recently, I dropped the anger and decided to feel the hurt instead, as much as I hate it. The result? Suddenly I have more wisdom to offer each of my children in the moment of crisis. Go figure.

So we've talked about feeling hurt. Now what about frustration? Living on this earth, with other people, means frustration. Why get mad just because we're frustrated? Nobody ever promised a frustration-free life, and if that's not enough argument for avoiding anger, then consider how often you frustrate others.

Next we have disappointment. If we have unreasonable expectations of others or of ourselves, disappointment can feel intolerable. But if we accept that humans disappoint, we can take it more in stride.

Let's leave anger for true injustice, and even then, stay sober-minded enough to come up with creative solutions. Think Martin Luther King Jr.

As for the primary emotions of disappointment, hurt, and frustration, resolve to walk through them, and make them your friends. They're part of life, you can tolerate them, and the sun will still come up in the morning.

Not only that, but you'll find wisdom you never knew you had, and you'll have no regrets.

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Find out more about Linda Moran's book How to Survive Your Diet.