Anger can be constructive or destructive. It's like having a fire in your house. When that fire is purposefully put into a fireplace, it brings warmth and comfort. When it is ignored and uncontained, it brings destruction.
For years I believed anger was always destructive and so I tried to suppress it. I tried to pretend it wasn’t there, but that doesn’t actually make it go away. The angry energy lurks below the surface and eventually it will show up somewhere, and when it did, I believed it meant that I was a bad person.
But when I started accepting that anger could be constructive, when I started to be purposeful about it, when I started to get curious about it, I was surprised to learn that it does some really important jobs for me. Paying attention to my anger and understanding why it’s showing up, has been a key to unlocking new growth and new health for me.
Which is why I wanted to spend a whole season talking about it.
On this first episode, my friend Becca joins me for an introduction to the topic. We talk about:
Intellectually knowing that anger is a valid emotion, but having a felt experience that it is bad and is something we aren’t allowed to do.
How we grew up thinking that anger isn’t nice, and we are required to be nice. But actually paying attention to our anger can make us more compassionate and help us have better connections.
How suppressing anger actually leads to disconnection, and it takes a lot of energy.
Ways we are deconstructing unhealthy views around anger and emotions, and how we are learning to accept the emotion of anger and pay attention to how it is helping us.
I’ll be back in two weeks with my friend Mark Brown to talk about the ways that anger masks other emotions and issues that are lurking just beneath the surface.
Speaking of my friend Mark, Some big news from me - I recently joined his company, TruNorth Coaching and Consulting. I’m very excited to be part of this group of coaches and consultants whose goal is to help others create emotional and relational health so they can have more energy for the things that matter most.
Here are some links that I mention in this episode:
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