Cutting Through Anger with a Clear Mind

What is anger? What lies inside this word that we use to express an emotion that gets us all worked up?

Often ones anger is caused by some provocation. Someone provokes you through some word or deed and this then triggers a chemical reaction which sends a signal from your brain to your limbic system that you experience as anger.

At the heart of it lies an uncomfortable feeling. However, where we deviate, is the way we respond to the feeling.

Because it has been provoked, we tend to think that it’s the other person's fault for our anger. We then project our anger on to the person or circumstance where it was provoked in the 1st place.

Projecting your anger means you’re not owning it but merely pushing it away or burying it within you resulting in further damage down the line. In relationships, this type of disownership results in miscommunication, mixed messaging and breakdowns in the relationship itself.

So, how to take ownership of your anger so it doesn’t negatively affect your relationships? A good place to start is to observe the uncomfortable feeling at the time of its provocation without reacting blindly to it.

One thing meditation teaches you is to keep your mind clear, still and calm so if you do get provoked, you are able to deal with the situation with maturity and skillful means.

Lets take the analogy of the sky and pollution. You’ve seen the sky when its crystal clear, bright blue, right? The sky is always like this. But when we see pollution in the sky, this alters our image of the bright blue sky. Now the mind perceives the sky as being altered, dark, and different due to the pollution.

But this is not the case. Even with the pollution the sky remains crystal clear blue. When the pollution passes, we see again the clear blue sky.

Its the same with our mind. The nature of the mind is clarity. But we allow ourselves to shape our behavior through the various circumstances of life, such as the provocation of anger.

We have to learn to 1st observe the feeling of anger and trace that back to our mind and the constant chatter that's reflected through our irrational behavior. Then we can begin to own our feelings and be better placed to handle more complexity with greater maturity and skillful means.