Trauma and Anger: Is My Anger “Bad?”
First of all, there is an idea that your anger is bad. If you’re having a hard time believing that, I want to help you understand why anger can be good.
I’m Sorry, but You’ve Been Programmed
So you have mixed messages about anger. You may have been infantilized or laughed at when you are angry. Or your expression of anger is treated as hysterical or “crazy.” Or you are treated as cold and frigid. Your anger has been invalidated or unacknowledged many times before. Others’ anger seems to be prioritized over yours, and you’re told you need to “calm down.” Instead of being met with curiosity, you are sometimes met with harsh punishments just for saying the word “no.” You may have been labeled as combative or “noncompliant” for disagreeing with an authority figure. You may have seen others express their “anger” in abusive, violent ways so you learn to be afraid of feeling angry.
We can feel conflicted and numb about anger for these reasons. Without a roadmap for managing anger, we can move towards passive-aggression. We sometimes swing from spongy to rigid boundaries. We may try to isolate ourselves from others when we feel angry out of fear we will lose them. We may even feel flooded by anger and feel so out of control like we might really lose it on someone. We might feel the drive to harm ourselves and turn the anger inward because it's the only “safe” option. What the brain perceives as “safe” is associated with pleasure and survival, keeping you in that pattern of behavior that you know is unhelpful but is so difficult to stop.
This all leads to the experience of shame - shame is often a replacement for anger when it has not been treated with respect or empathy. We don’t bother being angry over something that we are unbothered about. There is a difference between being truly unbothered and telling yourself you shouldn’t care. You have very likely had good reasons to be angry, but somewhere along the way you have been programmed to believe it is unacceptable to be angry. This belief, that you can only be acceptable when you behave inauthentically, eats away at your sense of self and overrides your intuition.
It is downright scary to be separated and disconnected from your instinct to be angry. But damned if you do and damned if you don’t. What will happen if you don’t? What will happen if you do? This double bind is what keeps us feeling ashamed and unprotected. We need a more meaningful sense of self-protection. It starts with arming yourself with facts about anger.
Anger Can Be Good!
Anger shows us what’s important to us, and offers a way for us to communicate what is important to us. When we recognize what is important to us, we find others who share our values. Anger allows us to be assertive and understand our own limits in our relationships. We must have limits if we’re going to be healthy human beings. Anger helps us feel real and like we matter. Anger can be an expression of love and care. We easily tend to the needs, wishes, and desires of those we love.
Anger makes us sit up straighter. We may puff out our chest so we take up more space. You may even find yourself looking at someone boldly straight in the eyes with a frown. What power. It’s highly improbable to feel depressed and angry at the same time. Irritability and depression, sure. But molten hot lava-like, earth quaking anger? Improbable.
Anger gives us strength. Anger protects us against victimization and helplessness. Anger signals to you that an injustice or unfair thing has happened to you, someone, or something you care about. Anger allows us to protect ourselves and others when they are wronged or violated. Anger has started movements that have cultivated lasting change in the world.
How to Feel Your Anger
Anger is only a feeling, not a behavior on its own. Feelings can drive behaviors and defenses, but just feeling angry cannot make you do harm. When you feel angry, there is a rush of emotion that eventually subsides when it is fully felt. For example, you can map the anger by identifying its shape, texture, temperature, and color. You can give the anger a name. You can get a felt sense of the age of the anger – how old is this anger? What are the thoughts and beliefs coming up right now? If you identify with having a system or headmates, who or what is creating the need for this anger? You talk through to the voice, like “I’m listening. What are you most concerned about, and how can I take care of that for you?” You may or may not get an answer right away, but sometimes just the willingness to listen is soothing all by itself.
The more we know about ourselves, the more we can empathize and move into non-judgment. We are able to get curious about what makes us angry and what we really need when that happens. We become teammates with our angry headmates. We eventually find it easy to give ourselves what we deserved all along without fear. That is true power.