Anger - Rage problem?

How difficult is it for you to maintain a calm or level head when people do things to upset you? Not just in class but in everyday life. Do you find yourself getting upset over what most would consider small things or is it only the large things that get you but once they do, you sometimes spin out of character?

I have sometimes had a problem with my temper. In most cases you would never know and a lot of my friends wouldn't believe it unless they have been friends for more than just a few years.



It takes a lot but once I am ticked, I am ticked (I am talking fist through a wall, denting the refridgerator ticked) and it takes a world of time and a lot of distance to make it go away or put it in its proper perspective again.



I hope I am not alone with these incidences. Does this happen to you? What do you do to regain your calm?

Dude,

I feel ya on this one.

I have a dented fridge to prove it. Normally, I am a pretty cool kat but certain things tick me off to no end. Like accusing me of something I didn't do. PLus I found if I hold things in and let it build the littlest thing will set me off...

A kinda funny story. When I was about 19 or 20 I was on the crapper. MY step brother accused me of taking his cigarettes. I was so [censored] I put my elbow throw the wall. It didn't make my dad happy.

As I got older I found just walking away, getting a breath and just chilling alone would help.

If that didn't work a good shot would do wonders.

ALmost forgot. My anger is how I broke my hand too.

Do you or anyone thing anger is hereditary? I ask because my brother is really hot headed and so was my grandfather. I don't think I am as bad as they were, at least I hope not. Plus, usually once I get hot it doesn't take long for me to cool down.

Scottie, are we sure we aren't related? I have the same problems but it got to a point I realized that I couldn't afford to fix things so stopped wrecking them. Here are three separate instances I am well known for at work.

1. Went golfing with a bunch of guys from work and it was a bad day. On the 5th hole I hit into a gully full of trees and I threw my seven iron that broke on a tree. I then tried to hit out of the gully with my 3 wood and bent it so I broke the head off the club. Then in a fit of rage I popped the top off the one and five iron, threw my bag through the air almost hitting some of my group and then I jumped up and down on the bag breaking the ball retriever. I then tossed everything into the creek except for the iron clubs that I didn't break and finished off the match.

2. At work somebody played a joke and wet my chair and I lost it. I picked up the chair and tossed it at the far wall having all four legs stick in the wall. Our building was new and so that I wouldn't get in trouble I threatened everybody's life if they told on me ... nobody did ... I was that convincing.

3. On my daughter's christening I had to mow the lawn. The lawn more wouldn't work so I picked it up and smashed it against the townhouse wall and then threw it threw the gate breaking it. I then got out the gas grass trimmer and it was out of gas so I smashed it over the broken lawn mower. I grabbed the electric grass trimmer and it wouldn't work so I smashed that as well. I then took out the rake and went ape all over everything until it was broken; then I called it a day.

Thankfully I started weight lifting in 1997 otherwise I probably would have killed somebody as this is only a small portion of what I have done over the years. I couldn't afford to keep breaking things. Anger never left and eventually started coming back so martial arts gave me another avenue to put this anger. I'm not a nice person when I get angry and people at work know better and when I go off they avoid me. Years ago I even screamed in the office that somebody should stab a frickin' salesman and toss his dead body into the river ... this salesman was one of our share holders and buddy to the president ... nobody said a word to me; probably afraid I'd come back to work and kill them all.

I still get angry and usually I look like I'm going to blow my top. Sometimes I can be set off by the smallest things and other times it takes a lot. I clench my teeth, turn red, squeeze my fists together and curse with the F-Bomb being my favorite word at that time and the more I can say it the better I feel. My wife and daughter are very afraid of this Dereck.

Again martial arts and weight lifting help in this aspect and I have better control, not to mention I don't want to be fiscally responsible for replacing or fixing things. I just hope that one day that I don't lose it on some idiot that deserves it, I'm too pretty to go to jail.

EDIT: I've also punched hard objects such as windshield in car when younger, cement floors and walls, my steel front door (within last year) ... I hear you Scottie.

Psssh. I was so angry that I broke my entire life between the ages of 14-22 or so. I don't let anger get to me that much anymore - it simply isn't worth it.

Things I have pit my fist into or through or messed my hand up on:

Refridgerator
Drywall
Bathroom door
Conrete wall (ouch)
Glass cubed wall (ouch)
Rear quarter panel of car
Car windshield
Tree (ouch)
Brick wall (ouch)
Washing machine

Things destroyed in anger:

VCR(s)
TV
Broom
Computer
Keyboard
DVD player
Playstation 1 and 2
XBOX

*Any electronic devices destroyed were functioning eratically at the time, probably in the middle of a high scoring game or prevented me from seeing the end of an action filled, suspenseful movie, thus deserving to die anyway*

I make no excuses for my actions. Whether having a really bad day or those events just happening to hit the right buttons at the wrong time, I dont know. I do my best to control what I can and realize when I am going a bit over the top but sometimes I need to just blow off some steam.

*Most of the above happened during the years 1986-1999. Tough period for me. Rarely happens now but lack of occurences sometimes means greater intensity when it does happen thus my need to seperate myself from others*

Scottie

Wow! I don't mean to laugh, but some of that was funny, YOu broke the grass trimmer over the broken lawn mower? Dang!

That is one of the reason I try to control my anger. IT can get very expensive.

Whoa! I ain't got nothing on u2. :O

Anger is most often a cover for other feelings such as hurt, frustration or fear, embarrassment or shame. Many times, particularly with men, we are not encouraged to speak about feelings. If you have the opportunity you could try talking about what you're really feeling without using the word "anger." Instead, try saying, "I am hurt/frustrated/afraid of ..." Anger is like a smokescreen. We think it is the issue when it fact it is only part of the issue.

Anger has a healthy purpose which can be to defend personal boundries be they physical or psychcological. It can also be used in unhealthy ways. We can use anger habitually as a way to avoid feeling unpleasant emotions. Anger used in that fashion can work just like alchohol or drugs. When it successfully helps us to avoid "feeling" what we are really feeling it is habit forming. As with any substance or behavior the protects us from feeling we are prone to build up a tolerance to it an need to use it more and more often and in greater quantities. In my opinion the remedy that is most effective is the willingness to increase my ability to experience and express the full range of of human emotions. The solution is not to experience less emotion (anger) but a fuller, richer and perhaps more satisfying (and painfull) emotional life. Then anger can take it's correct and appropriate place in the spectrum of options available to us, instead of controlling us.

I think you are right Mark. I think most of mine came from feelings of inadequacy, low esteem, and guilt from my dad being an alcoholic most of my childhood and some of my adult life. Took me quite a few years to realize what was going on with me.

Things are better now but not quite where they should be. Still trying to exorcise a few demons.

Quote:

---

The solution is not to experience less emotion (anger) but a fuller, richer and perhaps more satisfying (and painfull) emotional life. Then anger can take it's correct and appropriate place in the spectrum of options available to us, instead of controlling us.

---

Eh....I don't think I'm there yet. But I can deny/internalize/redirect inappropriately like a pro now.