My life was filled with broken plates, damaged relationships, and most of all, shame. When I think back on all those moments of anger the first word that comes to my mind is regret. Yet, despite the pain that anger caused, it took me years to realize that I had a problem and even longer to get it under control.

Stop Idealizing Anger

Anger is often idealized in the modern world. It is at the heart of daytime talk shows and reality TV; it’s even glorified in sports like football, boxing, and mixed martial arts.

The idealization of anger made me think that rage was an acceptable—even desirable—way of being. I was often tempted by the passion that rage invoked, but eventually I saw that anger offers a false promise.

Anger doesn’t just harm those it’s directed at; it also harms the person caught in its grasp. It has taken me years to come to terms with the things I’ve said and done when caught in fits of anger. But all of this taught me that I can’t allow anger to rule my life. So, I spent several years learning to tame this fearsome beast.

How to Stop Being So Angry

When I realized the damage that anger was causing in my life, I knew I had to make a change, but I didn’t know where to start. It was a tricky feeling to conquer.

Rage can feel random and unpredictable, and when it does occur, it happens so fast it can be hard to stop. So, instead of trying to stop rage, I decided to watch it. What I discovered not only revealed the secrets of rage, but also taught me to conquer it in a dramatic way. Below I share the steps that helped me be in control of my anger.

1. Notice when you feel angry

Anger and rage doesn’t come on suddenly, so the first step is to notice it during its early stages.

I did my best to notice anything that made me irritated or angry. Then I would pause and say aloud “I feel angry” or “I feel irritated.” This simple practice not only revealed what bothered me, it also gave me space to feel these emotions. Many times I found that simply admitting my anger enabled me to let it go.

2. Look for patterns

Once I was able to recognize anger, I began to see patterns emerge. Things like lack of sleep, hunger, and high levels of stress made me more susceptible to rage.

Of course, these may seem obvious, but watching how these conditions affected my mood taught me to notice and counteract these risk factors. I learned that eating regular meals and getting enough rest were two of the easiest ways for me to keep a cool head.

Related » How mindfulness helps reduce stress

3.  Look underneath your rage

Of course, in many cases my anger wasn’t connected to hunger or fatigue, so in these cases I searched for another cause.

I discovered that often anger arose to cover up an unpleasant feeling. When a driver cut me off in traffic, I felt angry because it hid my fear. When a friend cancelled plans, I felt angry because it hid my sadness. Anger was easier to feel than fear or sadness, because it was more masculine and powerful. When I realized what was beneath my anger and made space for those feelings, the anger would often vanish.

4. Seek out the roots of anger

After noticing my emotions, I began to look into the thoughts that came up around anger. I noticed that the first thoughts were always about other people. But just past those were an array of thoughts and beliefs about myself.

Some examples are:

I’ll never be as successful as my siblings.

I’m such a screw up. I never do anything right.

I’ll never make my parents proud.

All these thoughts revealed a series of deeply held beliefs about the world and my ability to live in it. Once I saw these beliefs, I was able to examine them more closely.

Now, when I discover these beliefs, I state them to myself aloud. For example if a friend cancels plans, I might say: “I feel afraid that this friend does not like me because part of me believes I am not likeable.”

By noticing these beliefs and admitting them to myself I have found that they hold less power over me.

5. Dig up the roots of anger

Once I knew about these hidden beliefs I began to break them apart.

I’ll ask myself, “Is this belief true?” Often this question will reveal that my belief isn’t based on reality, but on an old fear.

In the example above, I might ask “Is it true that I am not likeable?” Then I reflect: I have many friends and most of them seem to enjoy my company. So my belief that I am not likeable probably isn’t true.

Over time, I have used this technique to see through many of these deeply-held beliefs. And each time I see through them, they lose a bit of their strength. This doesn’t mean I never encounter these beliefs, but it does mean that they no longer control my life.

Also read » How To Stay Calm and Composed In All Situations

Don’t Let Your Emotions Control You

One question I get a lot after I explain these steps is, do you still get angry? And the answer I always give is, “Yes!

My goal has never been to suppress my feelings. I don’t strive to become an emotionless zombie. Instead, my intention is to not let my emotions control me. I want to be able to wield my emotions carefully.

Now instead of anger being an enemy, I have turned it into an ally. I now see anger as a sign that there is something I have been neglecting.

Don’t stay angry

But I no longer let myself stay angry. Still, there have been a few rare instances when I have flown off the handle. Each time I have made the effort to forgive myself, and learn from the experience.

The key in my continued work with anger is to always be patient and curious. I find that when I’m willing to slow down and look at what is going on, a solution presents itself.

Conclusion

No matter where you are on the spectrum of anger, it’s important that you don’t give up. You don’t have to live your life in fear of your own emotions. If you can learn to be more open and kinder to yourself, you can tame even the most fearsome demon within your heart.

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I was 14 when I started smoking for the first time. I had bought some cigarettes on a trip to Germany and brought them back to the States just to ‘try’. Once every few months I’d go out late at night and smoke just one cigarette.

I can still remember staring at the stars and feeling the waves of pleasure after each puff. Apart from the physical pleasure I loved sneaking around, breaking the rules, and the way smoking made me feel all grown up. Before long, I began to associate smoking with a sense of freedom and maturity.

Though this small habit was mostly innocent, it laid the groundwork for a much deeper habit later in life.

It wasn’t until years later when I went to college that smoking became a problem. I already had a positive association with smoking, but then college added one important ingredient: social pressure.

Smoking became a way to look cool, to talk to other people, and to feel relaxed and happy. At first, it was just a few puffs a week, but before long, I found myself smoking a pack of cigarettes a day.

Before long, smoking became my strategy for fulfilling all sorts of needs: it helped me feel accepted; it provided me with a simple social script to follow; it satisfied my oral fixation; it calmed me down; and it helped me feel rebellious and grown up.

And it’s because smoking was so useful that it became such a big part of my life.

Autopsy of a habit

Bad habits have power because they are useful. You see, we form bad habits because they make difficult tasks easier and/or because they help us deal with things we don’t want to face.

Bad habits provide us with a shortcut for dealing with our problem and meeting our needs. The problem is: once we get hooked on one method to meet our needs, we build our lives around that method and get stuck.

But we don’t have to be victims to these methods. In fact, by understanding what our bad habits are doing for us, we can learn how to defeat them.

For example, I tried and failed to quit smoking many times without success. These attempts were unsuccessful, because I never developed new strategies to fulfill the needs that smoking met for me.

Instead, I tried to convince myself I didn’t need comfort and social acceptance. But that didn’t work because, well, I do need those things. Everybody does.

Finally I realised that quitting was hard not because I was weak, but because not smoking made it hard to meet my needs.

Once I realised this, it became clear that if I wanted to quit I had to find a new way to fulfill the needs I got from smoking.

The big quit

Based on this discovery, I was able to develop a simple six-step plan to help me defeat smoking. This plan was so effective that I’ve used it many times since and I’d like to share it with you.

Step 1 – Look back

Take a moment and think back to when your bad habit emerged. Try to remember what was going on in your life.

Maybe you developed a habit of telling small lies because you feared a critical parent. Maybe you developed a habit of snacking because your grandmother offered snacks to you and you came to associate it with love.

Next, look at your life now and see how your relationship to this habit has changed. Does it still meet your needs?

Then take a moment to write down any observations that come up.

By looking at the origin of your habits, as well as how they are functioning today you can identify the needs they once met and perhaps are currently meeting in your life.

Step 2 –Find the needs

Based on the previous investigations, make a short list of the needs your habits used to and/or still meet in your life.

Next, spend some time reflecting on your history with these needs. Notice if any fear, anger, or a desire to shut down arises. By observing and understanding any feelings you have around these needs, you can better prepare for the emotional challenges that quitting might bring up for you.

Step 3 – Identify alternate strategies

Next, make two lists of alternate strategies for meeting these needs. On the first list, write strategies you can use in the moment to replace a habit.

For smoking, you might choose chewing carrots or gum, because these can replace the short-term sensory comfort of smoking.

On the second list, write strategies you can use to replace the bigger needs.

When I quit smoking, I made a point to spend time with non-smoking friends. I knew that this would meet my need for social acceptance as well as create situations where smoking would be discouraged.

Step 4 – Practice quitting

Quitting a bad habit is all about withstanding temptation. And the key to enduring temptation is to delay acting until the temptation passes.

One way to do this is whenever you notice the desire for your bad habit arising, set a timer for one to 10 minutes. Then your goal is to delay doing the habit until the timer goes off.

It’s not important whether you ultimately give in or not. If you can delay even for a moment, that’s success.

Step 5 – Set a date

After practising for a week or two, pick a quit date that makes sense. For example, I chose to quit right after moving into the monastery. I could have chosen to quit before that, but I knew the change in environment would support me, so I waited.

Once you have picked a date, post it on Facebook, call your friends, and mark it on your calendar. Ask your friends and family to check in with you and encourage you if they are willing. The more people you tell, the more likely you are to quit.

Step 6 – Quit

Once the big day arrives do your best to keep your mind busy but aware. Pay attention to times and locations that trigger your bad habit and put extra energy into your alternate strategies at those times and places.

If you like to smoke after eating, make plans to go to a movie right after dinner where you can’t smoke. Or make plans to eat with non-smoking friends.

If you do give in, don’t give up. Remember mistakes happen but your ability to endure small slips will only encourage you to keep going.

Endure, endure, endure

The second biggest risk comes when you think you have conquered your bad habit. No matter how far you think you’ve come, chances are you are still hard wired for your bad habit. So stay focused.

While I still have moments where I’m tempted to smoke, I know that each time I overcome that temptation I have more faith in myself to defeat any bad habit that stands in my way.

This was first published in the June 2014 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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