If nothing else, 2020 has given us a million reasons to be angry and afraid—two emotions that are actually closely related.
“Anger is often a secondary emotion to fear,” says Elisabeth Tarzwell, LCPC, counselor at Sheppard Pratt. “We’ll start feeling scared or afraid, and then anger follows shortly after.”
So it’s more than understandable that you might be dealing with additional anger in the new year and wondering how to manage it.
Understanding Anger
It’s important to recognize that anger is normal and often justified. When you feel angry, Tarzwell recommends “checking the facts” to validate your anger. “Look at the facts and ignore interpretations or assumptions,” she suggests. “When a goal of ours is being blocked, when we experience injustice, or when we feel threatened, the facts of the situation fit with our emotions.”
This recognition helps you validate your feelings, which in turn helps you manage them. “I think a lot of us get the message that anger is a bad thing, so when we start to feel it, we say, ‘It’s not OK to feel this,’ and we’re invalidating ourselves,” says Tarzwell.
If, instead, you look to the source of your anger—often a fear related to blocked goals, injustice, or threats—and acknowledge it is justified, you can give yourself the permission to feel that anger and deal with it in a healthy way. By contrast, Tarzwell compares bottling up your angry feelings to attempting to hold a beach ball underwater: It’s going to come back up and smack you in the face.
Coping with Anger
The first step to dealing with anger is validating it. But now that you know your anger is justified, what can you do? There are many tangible coping skills that Tarzwell shares with her patients. Here are a few you can try:
- MINDFULNESS. Tarzwell recommends taking time to sit with your emotions and understand them and the physical sensations they produce. “It will help you recognize the early signs of anger, and then you can address it at a lower level,” she explains.
- BREATHING TECHNIQUES. When we feel angry, our bodies fill with stress hormones, and our physical chemistry changes. Getting extra oxygen and practicing deep breathing can help the physical sensations that go along with anger subside. “Try paced breathing and breathing out longer than you are breathing in,” says Tarzwell. Start by breathing seven seconds out, then five seconds in, and repeat.
- REGULAR EXERCISE. Not only is exercise a great form of self-care, but it also helps you expel adrenaline, which can be produced when you feel intense anger. Even a 15- or 20-minute session can make a difference in how you feel.
- ART THERAPY. Creating art and doing crafts can give you an outlet for anger. For some people, it also helps them process their feelings, so they can better understand the roots of their anger.