The Transforming Power of Anger

Anger may have a strong hold over you, gripping you in its acid-bathed tentacles. Perhaps it is related to things that happened to you when you were young, or maybe you just never learned to control it well. You might have an explosive temper 'by nature', or you might 'see red' at the slightest provocation. However it is, when anger has a strong hold over you, as long as you do nothing to countermand it, you might say you are controlled by your anger.

Not a good place to be.

Renowned thinkers over the millennia have said some very salient and eye-opening things about anger:

• Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it on someone else; you are the one who gets burned. Buddha
• When you are offended at any man's fault, turn to yourself and study your own failings. Then you will forget your anger. Epictetus
• How much more grievous are the consequence of anger than the causes of it. Marcus Aurelius
• Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured. Mark Twain
• If you do not wish to be prone to anger, do not feed the habit; give it nothing which may tend to its increase. At first, keep quiet and count the days when you were not angry: I used to be angry every day, then every other day: next every two, next every three days! and if you succeed in passing thirty days, sacrifice to the Gods in thanksgiving. Epictetus

I have something to put out there for you today - simply in order that you give it some consideration. You might even put it on a back burner in your mind for a bit, in order that you are able to take a peek at it every so often for several days or weeks. Allow it to percolate inside you, rather than dismissing it at the outset, in order that you may - at some point in the near future - potentially reap the benefits of this thought.

And the thought is simply this: why not use your anger as a catalyst? Use it to allow you to transform yourself. Use the anger, as it arises, to practice being another. Much of this has to do with how aware you are (click on the mindfulness label under this post) in the moment that the anger arises, in order that you may begin a new self-dialogue around the anger thoughts (for nano-seconds), that will allow you to change how you now react. It's totally within your hands. You can - if you so desire - intend it. It's a choice.


Image: "Metamorphose" (bronze sculpture) found in http://www.cedip.de/kunst-edition-bronze_skulpturen-metamorphose/p1553

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