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Anger - what "to do" about it
This is a great question. I have struggled a lot with it. When I first started working with a TMS therapist via skype we would go into some detail about what to do with the anger, how to express it, feel it. For instance, if I am really angry at my husband, do I need to tell him about it? That's problematic for me(although I am sure my husband would disagree) but part of the reason I have trouble feeling anger is that somewhere along the line I learned it wasn't safe. My therapist would say that it was enough for me to just sit and imagine yelling at my husband and all the things I would do to him if I really let my anger go. This is in the fantasy realm so I could get as violent with it as I wanted. An angry day dream so to speak. I am not sure how well this worked for me. I also tried and still do write a lot when I am angry with the goal to really express it and let it out. I have a mad journal on my computer. This has helped. And just knowing that I have difficulty allowing myself to really feel anger has helped too. Ellen is so right about awareness and acceptance. And yet, there have been times this last year when I have really gotten angry and lost it, thrown all caution to the wind so to speak, and it has surprised me several times how good and painfree my body felt afterwards. And yet the answer cannot be to let yourself become an angry, out of control screaming lunatic. I am a very action orientated person so if something makes me angry I do really want to do something about it. But it truly is not necessary to act on the anger or solve what is making you angry in order to recover from TMS. The key is to FEEL the anger and for some of us that have not been doing that for a long time, we have to train ourselves in order to do it safely and without damaging important relationships. I am still figuring it out but getting better. Try to notice what you do when you get angry. Do you talk yourself out of it? Do you rationalize why you don't need to be angry? Do you get mad at yourself? Cry? Feel sad? That's directing the anger inward and it needs to go out. Its not enough to think about how angry you are, you need to connect with it physically, feel it, and allow yourself to express it in some way. That can be in a fantasy just telling someone off, or writing it out or screaming in a pillow. I didn't even realize that I hadn't been feeling the anger until I've learned better how to do it.