1The aim is not to become someone with no force in them. It is to get a harness on the force and point it at something worth doing.
Anger usually knows something true: this was unfair, this matters to me, this cannot carry on. Keep that part and drop the delivery. The energy can go into the letter, the boundary, the conversation you have been putting off, instead of into whoever happens to be nearest.
Islamic evidence
I plead my grief and sorrow before God (Quran 12:86). Ya'qub neither swallows what he feels nor spends it on the people around him. He takes it somewhere it can be held.
“He said, ‘I plead my grief and sorrow before God. I have knowledge from God that you do not have”
Qur'an 12:86
Psychological evidence
In a pilot randomised trial, an eight week loving kindness programme for people with chronic low back pain reduced both pain and anger. It is a useful hint that a practice aimed at goodwill can move anger without anyone trying to suppress it. The trial was small and preliminary, in one particular patient group.
Carson JW, Keefe FJ, Lynch TR, Carson KM, Goli V, Fras AM, Thorp SR. (2005). Journal of holistic nursing : official journal of the American Holistic Nurses' Association · doi
Review detail
Why it works. Energy that has somewhere to go stops looking for somewhere to leak.
Feedback
none yet2Knowing something calmly and feeling it are two separate achievements, and the second takes longer. If you can say the reasonable thing but it does not touch how you feel, you are partway, not failing.
The gap does not close by arguing with yourself harder. It closes by living it: doing the practice in real situations, in your body, while the feeling is actually present. More explanation at the kitchen table will not get you there.
Islamic evidence
We shall show you the easy way (Quran 87:8). The route from knowing to feeling gets easier by being walked, not by being studied.
“We shall show you the easy way”
Qur'an 87:8
Psychological evidence
A randomised trial in panic disorder with agoraphobia compared exposure carried out with the therapist there in the real situation against exposure simply prescribed for the patient to do alone. The guided version produced more pervasive and longer lasting effects. That is one anxiety trial rather than a general law, but it favours doing the thing in the real setting over discussing it.
Gloster AT, Wittchen HU, Einsle F, Lang T, Helbig-Lang S, Fydrich T, Fehm L, Hamm AO, Richter J, Alpers GW, Gerlach AL, Ströhle A, Kircher T, Deckert J, Zwanzger P, Höfler M, Arolt V. (2011). Journal of consulting and clinical psychology · doi
Review detail
Why it works. Feelings shift with the experience of doing something, not with agreeing to it.