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Areas › Anger › What anger actually is
Being articulate under provocation feels like being in control, and the two are easy to confuse. A cleanly aimed sentence often does more damage than a shout, partly because it was aimed. Worth knowing which way you tend to go, because that is the one to watch for in yourself.
How foul and evil is what you have done in my absence (Quran 7:150), said by a prophet on his return. Anger can be perfectly articulate and still be anger.
الأعراف
وَلَمَّا رَجَعَ مُوسَىٰٓ إِلَىٰ قَوۡمِهِۦ غَضۡبَٰنَ أَسِفࣰ ا قَالَ بِئۡسَمَا خَلَفۡتُمُونِي مِنۢ بَعۡدِيٓۖ أَعَجِلۡتُمۡ أَمۡرَ رَبِّكُمۡۖ وَأَلۡقَى ٱلۡأَلۡوَاحَ وَأَخَذَ بِرَأۡسِ أَخِيهِ يَجُرُّهُۥٓ إِلَيۡهِۚ قَالَ ٱبۡنَ أُمَّ إِنَّ ٱلۡقَوۡمَ ٱسۡتَضۡعَفُونِي وَكَادُواْ يَقۡتُلُونَنِي فَلَا تُشۡمِتۡ بِيَ ٱلۡأَعۡدَآءَ وَلَا تَجۡعَلۡنِي مَعَ ٱلۡقَوۡمِ ٱلظَّٰلِمِينَ
On his return to his people, angry and aggrieved, Moses said, ‘How foul and evil is what you have done in my absence! Were you so keen to bring your Lord’s judgement forward?’ He threw the tablets down and seized his brother by the hair, pulling him towards him. Aaron said, ‘Son of my mother, these people overpowered me! They almost killed me! Do not give my enemies reason to rejoice! Do not include me with these evildoers!’
Qur’an 7:150read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A meta-analysis of 306 experimental comparisons found that deliberately changing how you think about a situation reliably shifted how it felt, while simply trying to hide the feeling was among the least effective things to do. That covers the silent pole directly: going quiet and holding it in tends not to work. It says nothing about eloquence, so treat that half as clinical observation rather than tested finding.
Webb TL, Miles E, Sheeran P. (2012). Dealing with feeling: a meta-analysis of the effectiveness of strategies derived from the process model of emotion regulation.. Psychological bulletin doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Fluent, cutting speech is anger reaching for a sharper tool, not anger cooling down.
If you catch yourself saying you were teaching someone a lesson, ask what the lesson cost. Were you paid for the teaching, or are you the one still paying?
Anger that is still with you the next morning has changed shape. It is less an event by then and more a mood you are living inside.
Certainty closes a mind and a moment of not quite following opens it again. Sometimes the most useful thing you can say is the sentence that takes a second to work out.