Is Anger Really A Negative Emotion?

We have all felt it in some way, shape or form. Anger, rage or frustration; all different ways of describing varying forms of upset. Most of us have learnt to keep it under wraps for varying reasons, but is anger really as negative an emotion as we have been lead to believe? Let’s explore.

It is easier to be angry at someone, than it is to tell them you’re hurt.

Tom Gates

We are often taught, from a young age not to express our anger, to suppress it or to simply swallow it. I stumbled across an interesting article which discussed the importance of expressing our anger and that it is an important emotion and shouldn’t be dismissed. Expressing your anger in a healthy manner is good; being able to find ways in which to be able to express your anger, constructively is also important. Of all of the emotions, anger is the one which receives the most bad rep, and in some ways, rightly so- because it is responsible for a lot of damage. People who are unable to manage their emotions, who choose outbursts and violence have made it so that the emotion has become a pariah. But think about it this way, how many times has your anger pushed you to make another decision? How many times have you been so angry, you expressed how you truly felt? How many times has your anger forced you to leave a bad situation? For me, the honest answer is often. It took me being unhappy, uncomfortable and upset in order for me to seek an alternative solution. So, instead of looking at your feelings of anger as a bad thing, push through, sit with it and see what it’s really trying to show you.

Your anger is the part of you that knows your mistreatment and abuse are unacceptable. Your anger knows you deserve to be treated well, and with kindness. Your anger is a part of you that loves you.

Lyndsey Gallant

Suppressing your emotions are never the answer, for any emotion; because it isn’t your truth, you aren’t meant to hide your feelings. Finding ways to be open, honest and find a safe space to properly express how you feel, the same as you would when expressing sadness or happiness is what it’s all about. The goal we should be seeking is balance and healthy ways to channel strong emotions, not picking and choosing the “right” emotions or the ones we think are the “attractive” ones compared to the complex ones. Humans are never one thing at any given time and we are complex beings. We feels things, we express things and sometimes it’s a cocktail of layers upon layers of emotions. I don’t mean for us to be walking time bombs of emotions, but what I mean is to not bottle your anger, if it’s overwhelming speaking it out loud gives peace to it, saying something like, “I am upset, I need to take a couple minutes to clear my head”, that is being self-aware, honest and allows you to work through why you’re angry in the 1st place.

Needless to say, anger usually points us towards something, be it showing us something we may have unresolved, or showing someone a touchstone point in how you are feeling. I don’t think it’s something we should entirely hide, I do accept that there is a time and a place for everything, there are definitely environments where expressing all of your emotions may not be appropriate. But as ever evolving adults, and working towards being fully formed, accountable, flawed humans, we need to accept anger as part of the package that is being alive.