Sustainable Wellbeing
We’re not Languishing — We’re Fucking Pissed Off
The fog has cleared and it’s been hiding a simmering fire of rage.
*for the audio version of this piece click here.
Adam Grant wasn’t entirely wrong back in April 2021 when he wrote about the feeling of languishing — there was a time when most people I spoke to on the other end of my coaching calls felt ‘meh’. Languishing was the buzzword of the summer and its defining characteristics of a foggy restlessness mixed with empty stagnation felt like it fit how we were collectively feeling.
My clients and I would spend our 30 minutes together talking about reigniting passions and getting moving again. Finding flow activities and taking small steps forward. Slowly but surely people began to allow themselves to dream again. They found passions they could pursue and started moving towards them again. We stumbled forwards with the clumsy gait of legs painful and tingly from sleep — but we were moving forward.
Back then Adam wrote that ‘languishing’ was perhaps the “dominant emotion of 2021”.
But that was then.
And now is now.
And now is… different.
The fog has cleared and it’s been hiding a simmering pool of rage all this time.
My client list is diverse in age, cultural background, family make-up, sexuality, and professions. I have HR professionals, Start-up CEOs, Nurses, Musicians, Real Estate Professionals, Graphic Designers, Doctors, Managers, Chaplains — they couldn’t be more disparate — except for the fact that they are all dealing with feelings of anger.
They’re angry at their companies, their bosses, their direct reports, their patients, their neighbours, governments, students, teachers, family, friends, strangers, mother nature, science, themselves — they just feel ANGRY. ALL. THE. TIME.
Our conversations have shifted from how to reignite their passions to how to douse the flames of indignation burning just beneath the surface. People are seething with a ferocious furore matched only by their inability to know what to do with it.
And I can’t blame them — I’m one of them. I’ve felt myself yelling more, rolling my eyes more often, clenching my jaw, and snapping at my husband more than ever.
It’s not difficult to discover why we are all boiling bottles of quiet discontent. We are surrounded by completely valid reasons to be angry. We SHOULD be angry.
The problem isn’t anger.
The problem is that a lot of us have no idea what to do with it.
Why is that?
Full disclosure: Anger is the one emotion category that I have the smallest window of tolerance for. As a recovering people pleaser, feeling and dealing with my anger is…a continuing work in progress.
Choosing to feel and deal with my feelings of anger has not been easy. After a lifetime of pretending I was the one human being on earth who did not experience anger, I lack sufficient skills to deal with it effectively.
My relationship with anger is not unique. I see and hear it replicated in social media posts, blog posts, and in my client calls.
Here’s how the topic of anger comes up most often in session:
“I know that I shouldn’t, but…” or,
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have let myself…” or,
“I just need to let it go, I shouldn't let it bother me…”
We have this built-in reaction to anger as something that we shouldn’t be feeling. We often feel ashamed of feeling angry — even when it is the appropriate feeling to feel.
We have A LOT of valid reasons to be angry these days, and when we feel ashamed of our anger, when we ‘shouldn’t’ our anger, we not only brush off the feeling — we brush off the cause. We make excuses, snap at our husbands and try to just NOT feel it.
A lot of this shame is not ours to own. A lot of it comes from our cultural understanding of anger. It is often depicted as its worst form — violent outbursts from someone out of control. Not all cultures view anger in the same way — but the culture that we grew up in will have an impact on our relationship and reactions to anger.
When I look at my children and how I react to their anger I can start to see where my relationship — and lack of tools for coping with anger come from.
Screaming “DON’T HIT/KICK/BITE or SPINNING BACK FIST YOUR SISTER” at my five-year-old is generally followed by her roundhousing her sister and me having to discipline her for that. In these small interactions, I am forced to deal with the behaviour that came from the anger — instead of helping her to deal with the cause of her anger.
Violence is never acceptable — but anger itself is not the culprit.
Anger can be so painfully uncomfortable that the actions we take to alleviate it are often poorly thought out and while beneficial in the short term — only lead to longer-term problems
So what can we do?
Here are three ways that I have learned to face my firey hell pit of wrath that I have found effective for myself and my clients:
Name it to Tame it
We tend to speak in broad non-descriptive language when it comes to our emotions. This emotional granularity can make it difficult to know what the appropriate action to take is.
The actions you need to alleviate feeling hurt, disrespected, indignant, or injustice vary as widely as the experience of those feelings. Using a tool like a feelings wheel can help to identify what you are actually feeling. If you are struggling to find something that fits, look to other languages for those feels that just don’t translate.
Let it Go
More than simply a Disney platitude making an effort to let go of your anger could be beneficial — however just like in the movie it might take some practice to get the hang of it without plunging the world into an unending winter.
Letting go is made easier when we know what exactly we need to let go of. So combining this skill with Naming to Tame will double your impact! Understanding your zones of control, influence, and concern is a helpful skill in making that choice.
Don’t Suppress — Express
Once we know where to focus our efforts it is likely time to communicate with others. This can often be the most challenging part of experiencing and accepting our anger. We can be tempted to just ‘accept it and deal with it’ on our own. This act of attempted suppression only serves to spread our anger like throwing water on an oil fire.
Instead of ‘just dealing’ with it — try communicating your needs, boundaries, or frustrations to someone you trust, or ideally, the person who can help you make some changes. Plan out your communication strategy so that it doesn’t turn from expressing to venting.
- Get clear on what it is that you are feeling
- Identify the parts of that feeling that you control
- Identify the issue that needs to be communicated (do you need to communicate a need? Or set a boundary?)
- Recognize that others have emotions about the issue as well — you remember what you can control and what they can control
- Focus on your experience and take ownership of your emotions — you can’t make them feel any type of way, and they can’t make you feel any type of way.
- If you feel ‘flooded’ take a deep breath or a sip of water
- It will take practice, so go easy on yourself.
As we learn to harness the power of our internal infernos we can start to work together for productive solutions to the causes. Instead of being swept away with our desire to not feel the disquiet that anger causes we can face these challenges with the burning fury that lies just beneath the surface. Anger is not an emotion to be feared, avoided, or shamed for feeling. It is a powerful tool to motivate ourselves and others to work together for change.
Did you know?
Listening to music that matches your emotion can actually help to alleviate your feelings of anger? Use this soundtrack as a starting off point and build your own anger relieving playlist.
