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Areas › Anger › The moment before you snap
This is not a way of excusing what you do, it is a way of aiming the work. When a reaction is far bigger than the moment deserves, ask what it reminds you of rather than who is at fault here. The heat often drops on its own, because you stop needing this person to admit to something they never did.
God does not change the condition of a people [for the worse] unless they change what is in themselves (Quran 13:11). Change is described as beginning on the inside, which is where an old reaction lives.
الرعد
لَهُۥ مُعَقِّبَٰتࣱ مِّنۢ بَيۡنِ يَدَيۡهِ وَمِنۡ خَلۡفِهِۦ يَحۡفَظُونَهُۥ مِنۡ أَمۡرِ ٱللَّهِۗ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ لَا يُغَيِّرُ مَا بِقَوۡمٍ حَتَّىٰ يُغَيِّرُواْ مَا بِأَنفُسِهِمۡۗ وَإِذَآ أَرَادَ ٱللَّهُ بِقَوۡمࣲ سُوٓءࣰ ا فَلَا مَرَدَّ لَهُۥۚ وَمَا لَهُم مِّن دُونِهِۦ مِن وَالٍ
each person has guardian angels before him and behind, watching over him by God’s command. God does not change the condition of a people [for the worse] unless they change what is in themselves, but if He wills harm on a people, no one can ward it off–– apart from Him, they have no protector
Qur’an 13:11read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
In laboratory experiments, recalling an anger-provoking event was not the problem in itself. Turning it over and over prolonged the anger and raised blood pressure, while reinterpreting the same memory brought both down. So going back to the source helps when it is looked at freshly and harms when it is only rehearsed.
Ray RD, Wilhelm FH, Gross JJ. (2008). All in the mind's eye? Anger rumination and reappraisal.. Journal of personality and social psychology doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Seeing the old pattern separates it from the present person, so there is less to defend.
If the older scene is a trauma, this is work for a safe setting with support, not something to open up in the middle of an argument.
Awareness runs a step behind the feeling. The work is not to stop anger arriving, it is to widen the gap between noticing it and acting on it.
The braking part of the brain is not finished until the mid to late twenties. A teenager who cannot hold their tongue is not being defiant, they are working with equipment still under construction.
Before you start a practice that needs a pen and paper, have the pen and paper. It sounds too small to matter and it is the difference between doing the exercise and daydreaming about it.