As a counselor I deal with people on a
regular basis who have trouble controlling their anger. I hear all kinds of
reasons why they are angry, with the majority of people blaming someone else
for their problem. Most of the time people are angry because they are
self-centered and they haven’t learned to delay gratification. Who hasn’t seen
a two-year-old get angry and begin sulking because he doesn’t get his way?
Really, when you see an adult with an explosive anger problem, you are looking
at an adult with a two-year-old capacity for self-control.
Most of the time people use their anger
to control other people. Anger is an effective tool, albeit dysfunctional. That
is it works as long as the other person is willing to respond to the anger.
Solomon said, “A hot-tempered man must pay the penalty; if you rescue him, you
will have to do it again” (Proverbs 19:19). Every time we respond by doing or
not doing what some angry person wants from us, we are enabling their anger
problem. We are coming to their rescue each time, the same way we do for a small
child.
When a person is angry at someone for
not responding the way they want them to, they are showing they have no
self-control. That’s why we often refer to angry people as people who “lose
it.” The person who is angry is the person with the problem. The challenge
comes when you choose to allow the anger to stay in the other person and not to
allow it to make you angry. As long as we allow the other person’s anger to
control us, we will remain in bondage to them. Anger is so often a cue for us
to do something. We feel the need to get the angry person’s approval or to defend
ourselves with responding anger. However, neither of these approaches will help
either person. When we respond appropriately by speaking the truth in love and
with the right attitude, we are obligating the other person to choose how they
will respond to us.[i]
Sometimes that means we will say something
like “I’m not going to allow you to yell at me. When you calm down and want to
talk, I will listen.” Such a response often times helps the angry person learn
self-control. They will at least learn that their angry rages won’t work on you
anymore, and they will choose another method of communication. Most importantly,
they will learn you cannot be controlled as you demonstrate you don’t have to
respond in anger to anger.
There are always consequences to these
kinds of choices. Perhaps the person decides not to talk you at all or to cut
you off. You risk that consequence if you want freedom from another person’s
dysfunctional anger. There is great freedom in learning self-control.
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