anger is a tooth

When I was still in social work school back in 1999, I was tasked by my practicum at Kids In The Middle with teaching a court mandated class on co-parenting for divorcing parents in the city of St. Louis.  My supervisor and friend, Jen taught it with me.  We were about 27 years old and neither of us were married.  Nor had children.  We were not stupid enough to think we knew exactly what we were talking about, but we did think we were kind of awesome considering the circumstances.  I remember walking away from the class thinking,  "I actually think that went pretty well.'  We must have had some really nice, kind people we were speaking too, because I can only imagine what we looked like to our 'students' -  there is no other way to say it - we were young, inexperienced white girls with a good deal of guts, but no street cred at all.

And just like with so much of life, we don't always know where our lessons will come from and which ones will stick with us.  Here's one that continues with me today, 13 years later - it was part of the curriculum - something I was supposed to be teaching on those Tuesday nights so many years ago.  It's so simple, it's almost childlike:

Anger is a tooth with two roots:  sadness and fear. 

If you think about it, almost every time you're angry you can examine the roots of that anger in sadness and fear.  When my kids are bugging the hell out of each other and I finally lose my temper with them, I am sad, wondering if they will ever get along or I am fearful that I will not have a moments peace or I am fearful one of them will get hurt by the other.  When I am mad at the guy who cut me off driving, at root, I am scared I will get hurt or scared that I will be late.  When I have a client who is angry with her father, it may be because she is afraid she will never have the relationship with her father that she longs for.  When I talk with a client who is angry with his wife, it may be because he is really sad that he doesn't know how to ask for his needs to be met. 

I believe it is Thich Nhat Hanh who says that living with anger is like living in Hell.  I don't think all anger is bad - in fact I've written about it before. I've read that anger is like a warning sign, a flashing light that tells us, "Pay attention.  There has been a violation of some kind."  Once we pay attention, I don't think we need to just throw out the anger and tell ourselves that if we're emotionally healthy we just 'get over it.' 

But, I do recommend sitting with the anger for a few minutes before you respond.  Try imagining that tooth.  What are the roots.  Are you sad?  Are you fearful?  If you have time, write down all the parts of that situation that might make you sad or fearful.  I guarantee that when you respond, when you address the violation, you will be addressing it in a more honest way and you will feel better about how you handled that situation.