Loading practices
Loading practices
Areas › Anger › Choosing your response
Slow breathing, standing still, looking interested rather than braced: none of that is passive and none of it is agreement. An argument escalates when two nervous systems climb together, and it is hard for one to climb on its own. You can hold your line perfectly well at ordinary volume.
The servants of the Lord of Mercy are those who walk humbly on the earth, and who, when the foolish address them, reply, 'Peace' (Quran 25:63). The reply is short and level, and it is not a surrender.
الفرقان
وَعِبَادُ ٱلرَّحۡمَٰنِ ٱلَّذِينَ يَمۡشُونَ عَلَى ٱلۡأَرۡضِ هَوۡنࣰ ا وَإِذَا خَاطَبَهُمُ ٱلۡجَٰهِلُونَ قَالُواْ سَلَٰمࣰ ا
The servants of the Lord of Mercy are those who walk humbly on the earth, and who, when the foolish address them, reply, ‘Peace’
Qur’an 25:63read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
Pooled neuroimaging studies show that deliberately reinterpreting a situation brings in frontal control regions and quietens the amygdala, so a change of mind has an effect you can measure in the body's alarm system. This is brain imaging in controlled tasks, a long way from being shouted at in your own kitchen. It supports the idea that staying calm can be something real rather than a face you put on.
Buhle JT, Silvers JA, Wager TD, Lopez R, Onyemekwu C, Kober H, Weber J, Ochsner KN. (2014). Cognitive reappraisal of emotion: a meta-analysis of human neuroimaging studies.. Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
The other person's rising heat has nothing to push against if yours does not rise to meet it.
Draw a small circle on three separate scraps of paper without thinking about it. Then look: same size, same spot on the page, same direction of stroke, same starting point, nearly every time.
A break only counts if you come back. Notice the anger, leave the room, actually settle yourself, then return and finish the conversation.
Whichever response you practise is the one getting stronger. Today's small choice is not a test you pass or fail, it is a deposit.