Anger question

RedDeadWolverine · 2015-09-29T02:01:55+00:00

Just remember that a woman looks at anger the same way as a little kid would. When you lose your cool and yell, they are not hearing the content, instead they just perceive the anger. It's an ineffective approach to problem solving.

If my five year old does something and I fly off the handle about it. I'm now the one in the wrong. It's the same with your wife, she cares fuck all about your "feels", to her you're just being an asshole. Be above reproach, don't give her the satisfaction of losing your cool and yelling or being passive aggressive.

FearDearg2015 · 2015-09-29T05:52:08+00:00

In "The power of now", by eckhart tolle, he says that the best way to deal with emotions like anger is to turn your focus and attention onto the anger, and the physical sensations inside your body when you are angry. It's not what you feel that matters, it's how you feel about what you feel. Anger tends to be an undesirable emotion, and its usually that sense of wanting to not be angry that people get really upset about.

It's natural for you to want to ruminate on the anger, and to figure out what caused it, and what you can do to stop it. Tolle says that if you instead just "let it be" because it is already a fact, part of your "now", and just be a non - judgemental observer of your own internal state, you can overcome such negativity. Once you start to focus on the internal reality of "present moment anger", you find yourself noticing the tension in your body, or increased heart rate, or thoughts popping up about what made you angry. Instead of trying to suppress those things, you just accept them as part of what is happening right now, instead of making a judgement of yourself as an "angry person", for example.

If you have not read "The power of now", I recommend it highly. I saw it mentioned on some RP reading list somewhere,can't find the link though.

To Answer your general question, is not as important as you think to figure out "what" you are angry about. It's more important to learn to accept your emotions as they are, and to operate on a higher level of consciousness. It's OK to be angry. When you are aware of the anger, in the now, then you can take control over your responses instead of unconsciously reacting to stimulus. You'll get it wrong more than right, but you will be firmly at the controls and not bobbing along on autopilot, being governed by your emotions

Countpudyoola · 2015-09-29T17:47:43+00:00

We all have emotions that range. You could be fine with something, think about it again and then get mad. You can slip back and forth. It's always how you deal with it that dictates how it affects you.

I like meditation, relaxation, and working out emotions through exercise/weights.

You may want to write some free form journal (where no one else can, delete afterwards) to work through issues you may have from the past. Really take a third person approach. There's probably a billion and one books on anger and stress management.

And whether they come unbidden or not, what you choose to do with that emotion is still up to you and under your control.

ThatOtherMarriedGuy · 2015-09-28T21:21:14+00:00

For me at least, "holding frame" is still a matter of not showing anger rather than not being angry. I've calmed down my interactions with my wife to the point that I haven't raised my voice to her in several months, and that's great, but I still get just as angry, I think.

I'm angry every night when I get a hard no for sex. Hell, I get a little ticked off when I walk in the door and she's not waiting for me with a cold drink and a blowjob.

Even though I've "let go" of my covert contracts for the most part, I still get angry that my wife isn't holding up her end of the marriage deal (sexual fidelity in exchange for sexual access). I get angry that it is now conventional wisdom in fucking America that wives have no obligation to have sex with their husbands unless they want to.

Etc.

So for me, part of "holding frame" is bottling up that anger. I just have to be watchful and not let it boil over. Presumably, in a few months or years, none of this shit will bother me any more and I'll just laugh at it with my totally authentic amused mastery.

For now, though, it's fake it till I make it.

irateMD · 2015-09-28T22:09:10+00:00

Everyone's expectations and definitions are a bit different when it comes to the anger phase. Anger and resentment toward my wife was intense enough to distract me before MRP. I felt that I was beyond the anger phase when I was no longer distracted by my frustrations and I no longer resented my wife or myself for previous patterns of behavior. Anger would come back in waves, lasting days at a time, but the resentment never returned. Now I get angry only about single events or behaviors, and only long enough to display my disapproval and move on.

Example from this morning: my wife used the F-word in front of our 2 year old because my cellphone's touchscreen was "too sensitive." I told her not to swear in front of our son, pointed out that the cellphone was not a curse-worthy issue, and immediately felt better. Anger gone.

Stoic is not unfeeling. You can still have the highs and lows. There was a good post on this in MRP in the past day.

When it comes to anger for me, the events leading up to an interaction affect my state of mind and how likely I am to be annoyed vs amused. Sleep deprivation and physical pain also have an impact on my bullshit tolerance.

There was no specific reading that helped me, personally. It has just gotten better gradually as I have worked on making myself and my life better.

enfier · 2015-09-28T22:13:16+00:00

Well, I was angry at my parents for a rather long time. Hell, I'm still angry but I'm not really wasting an effort on it, because in the end it only hurts me.

Diving deep down into the reasons why just isn't important. It doesn't matter if the reason was justified, you don't need to process it and you don't need to figure it all out in order to let it go. So long as you can recognize when it's happening and then choose to have a different reaction to it, you can leave it in the past.

When you find yourself angry, try to identify the situation that set it off. Take notes if you need to. After a few you should be able to get a handle on what sets your anger off and then you can manually choose to override that reaction the next time that situation crops up.

SorcererKing · 2015-09-28T22:32:34+00:00

Just in case you missed it: The Anger Stage.

BluepillProfessor · 2015-09-29T03:14:11+00:00

This is super common when unplugging. You have been lied to your entire life by every single woman you ever met. Every single woman you trusted lied to you about what attracts them.

The bitches! The cunts! Holy fuck, I believed it all so now I am the fuckmeuptheass.

It does get better but it takes a year or more to really get over the pulse pounding panic attacks. At least that is how long it took me.

Scurvemuch · 2015-09-29T12:54:00+00:00

So to clarify. I appreciate everyone's responses. They are all helpful

I am specifically talking about repressed anger, specifically when I did not yell or anything like that.

Specifically I have had trouble with ejaculation during / after intercourse. from my research , its very likely a repressed anger issue... this is where the concern on my end is coming from

marxistbacon · 2015-09-28T22:21:08+00:00

Anger can be really enlightening, if you follow it. Sometimes it's nothing more than being mad and you "get through it" just by letting it come and then it simply ebbs away. But often, anger masks a deeper feeling of hurt. Layers of an onion and all that - peel back the anger layer to find the underlying hurt. Was this anger related to feeling hurt that she didn't respect your feelings over having another kid? Was it that you felt hurt that she changed her mind or something and owed you a commitment to her word instead? Was it hurt that she made some kind of "dig" or nasty remark at you and you felt hurt that she would treat you that way?

Look at the "covert contracts" from NMMNG. Man acts out a script, woman refuses to reply in the expected way. Man is hurt (by sexual rejection, e.g.) and this fuels anger manifesting as victim puke. But this bridge from hurt to anger can play out in more ways than just the CC, even though we sometimes attribute all male mis-behaviours to CC's here in the MRP comments. Woman makes a nasty remark, of, say, light to moderate nastiness, in another context. But man reacts with anger manifesting as full-blown rage. This should tell him that he has a particular hurt related to the remark. It should serve as an indicator that he has a vulnerable trigger point and he should look in a particular direction to fix it. Whether it be that it triggers a feeling of childhood insecurity, or some phobia he has, or whatever. We all have them. Just tracing through the causes (instead of just repeating "that bitch! I can't believe she would have the gall to say XYZ!!") sometimes has the effect of both dissipating the anger and bringing a little more awareness of the next thing in your psyche to work on.

True, doing this too much can just lead to endless navel-gazing. But if you have a particular trigger you can identify, it may help.

More concrete example: my girl used to make cracks at me accusing me of still feeling a certain way about an ex. Now I'd told her over and over that the accusation was absurd, and it is in fact absurd and complete bullshit. Can't stand the ex, and the remark was just coming from insecurity or jealousy on her part. But I'd get really mad anyways, total loss of frame. Eventually I figured out that it wasn't the thing about the ex that made me mad. It was that it felt to me like she was trying to hurt me deliberately by that accusation. And that brought up all kinds of memories of people whom I'd gotten close in my past to who had turned around and deliberately hurt me in similar ways. And the anger was 99% in me and my interpretation of it rather than the 1% that was her remark. Just knowing that made it easier to realize that the slurs about me and the ex were nothing more than a regular shit test to be disposed of, and keep a level head.

Another question to ask yourself, is "do I get anything out of being angry"? As fucked up and pathological as it sounds, you've been here long enough to know that's how people work sometimes. Do you get to "play the victim" afterwards with slighted feelings? Do you get to feel dominant by expressing your anger (though dunno how much if any you expressed)? Not that as an RP guy you consciously do any of these, but ask yourself anyways.

Anyways, lot of rambling. You can also try lifting. Last time I got so mad, I did leg day. Could barely walk right for three days after. Very therapeutic too :-)

Title	Anger question
Author	Scurvemuch
Upvotes	4
Comments	15
Date	September 28, 2015 9:14 PM UTC (10 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/askMRP
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/askMRP/comments/3mr0ol/anger_question/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/askMRP/anger-question.208076 https://theredarchive.com/post/208076

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