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Areas › Anger › Equanimity and perspective
The person sent by a court, or pushed into the room by a partner or a manager, walks in already read. Try starting the hour with nothing written: no history of what people like this are usually like, no forecast of how it will end. Notice the moment you catch yourself predicting them, and go back to what they are actually saying. This is as much for anyone meeting a difficult relative as for a clinician.
If they turn away, say, God is enough for me: there is no god but Him; I put my trust in Him (Quran 9:129). Even someone turning away is met with trust rather than with a verdict about them.
التوبة
فَإِن تَوَلَّوۡاْ فَقُلۡ حَسۡبِيَ ٱللَّهُ لَآ إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَۖ عَلَيۡهِ تَوَكَّلۡتُۖ وَهُوَ رَبُّ ٱلۡعَرۡشِ ٱلۡعَظِيمِ
If they turn away, [Prophet], say ,‘God is enough for me: there is no god but Him; I put my trust in Him; He is the Lord of the Mighty Throne.’
Qur’an 9:129read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
In a cross-sectional study using structural equation modelling, higher trait mindfulness went with less anger, hostility and aggression, and lower rumination partly explained the link. The relevant piece is that hostility travels with a habit of mind, which applies to the helper in the room as much as to anybody else. The data were gathered at a single point in time, so this shows what goes together, not what causes what.
Borders A, Earleywine M, Jajodia A. (2010). Could mindfulness decrease anger, hostility, and aggression by decreasing rumination?. Aggressive behavior doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
People can feel when you have already made your mind up, and they behave like the person you expect.
There is an old set of pictures: a boy loses an ox, catches sight of it, chases it, tames it, and finally rides it home. Asking which picture you are in this week is kinder and more useful than asking whether you are doing well.
Focus on the person and it feels personal. Widen out to what is around them, the hour, the queue, the week they are having, and it usually stops being about you.
Try putting a qualifier on the front of your strongest claims. In some ways this is true. In some ways it is not. In some ways I cannot tell from here.