Them, Not You - Grasshopper

Here’s an observation about angry people I’ve come to notice over the years. They’re more angry with themselves than they are with you.

You may be on the receiving end of their ire, but It’s my experience, that they’re the ones under fire.

They have to put it “out there” so they can escape its wrath, but it’s only a temporary solution. When you’re out of sight, they still have to deal with their internal fright.

Angry people are scared to death. They’re scared the feelings they have will consume them and burn them up, so they need an outlet, and you conveniently just showed up.

They were angry before you got there. 

Have you ever been on the receiving end of road rage? You may have forgotten to put on your turn signal to carefully change lanes, but you’d think you caused a 10 car pileup by the reaction of some horn blaring clown, whose facial expression was more than a frown. 

Maybe the angry person is you. Not the occasional outbursts we all have, but an abundant supply of outrage that demands to be center stage.

What to do?

Notice that you have anger within you. That’s the key to metabolizing the feeling you call anger. 

Find out where that sensation registers in your body and put your attention on that feeling. 

Let’s suppose that your sensation is a tightened jaw. Give all your attention to that feeling. That means to stay in your body and out of your head. Your head will attempt to justify the feeling and tell you its cause is “out there” somewhere, when in reality it’s inside you and in need of repair.

The way to get anger to get off your plate is to notice and sit with the sensation. Fully feeling the sensation inside of you is giving anger its due. You start to recognize that it belongs to you. You’re the only one who can make it go away, not some poor sap on the receiving end who just got in the way.

It takes some practice to notice and fully feel your angry sensations. And when you recognize these feelings belong to you, that’s when you’ll metabolize them, and your facial color will turn from red to a more pinkish hue.

All the best,