Anger is something I have struggled with my entire life. As a child, my parents jokingly nicknamed me ‘Boris Buskruit’ which means something like ‘Boris Dynamite’ in Dutch, because I could become so incredibly angry. One of the favorite stories told about me during tea visits was how, as a four-year-old boy on a cycling holiday, I once bent a tent pole with my small fists, and how everyone at the campsite laughed so hard at the sight. Anger has become something I feel ashamed of and guilty about.
I always try to be friendly and kind to others. Sometimes it seems as if I can sense exactly what everyone wants. Or am I perhaps just filling in the blanks? In any case, I must be careful not to lose myself while I am so busy satisfying what I assume to be the needs of others. Because if I lose sight of my own needs as a result, those others will naturally be blamed by me at some point. And then I become incredibly angry, and yes, I subsequently feel very ashamed of that again.
According to psychologist Daniel Goleman, author of the book ‘Emotional Intelligence‘, having and expressing emotions is a natural function of our brain, originally intended to ensure our needs are met. It is therefore healthy to feel emotions, including anger, and it is a relief to be able to express them. For me, it is a liberating thought that we are all the product of an evolutionary development process spanning millions of years. It makes me more compassionate toward myself and others when an angry reaction occurs. Marshall Rosenberg, the founder of Nonviolent Communication, refers to anger along with shame, guilt, and depression as ‘the four friends’ because they provide valuable information about what is apparently important to you. Although everyone ‘suffers’ from these emotions at times, we hardly learn anything about them during our upbringing or at school—except, perhaps, that we should suppress them.
Nonviolent Communication has provided me with many insights and skills that benefit me on a daily basis. I can still lash out quite severely at times toward friends, my children, my parents, my partner, colleagues, or my ex, especially when the pressure or busyness becomes too much. And afterward, I feel terrible. But at the same time, I am glad that I now sense my frustration rising in time in many cases, and that I increasingly make choices that prevent things from escalating that far. And if I do feel irritation or rage building up, I now know ways to calm myself or step out of the situation. When I do release my anger, it increasingly comes out in a way that keeps the damage to the relationship with the other person within limits. I also now have a better understanding of how to deconstruct my anger afterward for myself to understand what it was that truly affected me, and I can explain this to the other person so that reconnection is possible.
See here which training courses I offer in the fields of Mindfulness and Nonviolent Communication.