ANGER & SELF ESTEEM

What is Anger?

Anger is a normal emotion, and under the right circumstances it is quite healthy and perfectly justifiable. But if you have low self-esteem, you usually don’t express anger in a healthy or positive way, or even feel it for the right reason. You express it in negative ways.

Ironically, this is very often because when you have low self-esteem, you feel like others don’t think your feelings are important; so, you over-express your anger hoping that someone will “finally” pay attention to you. Plus, feeling bad about yourself makes you even angrier.

Self-esteem and anger have a strong connection. When you lack self-esteem, you are probably dissatisfied with your life in general. Since blame is better to give than to receive, you seek others to place the blame on for your miserable life.

This means that very often, when something makes you mad,  whether it really should or not, you add the fires of indignation and resentment to your anger, making everything worse. Likewise, if you have low self-esteem, you feel cast out, unwanted, and unattractive. You feel hurt by others, and so when you get angry you use this as an opportunity to hurt them.

“Anger is nothing more than an outward expression of hurt, fear and frustration. – Phil McGraw”.

Anger is defined as strong feelings of displeasure or hostility. It’s an emotion that arises when somebody else violates codes of conduct or concepts that you hold dear or sacred.

[1]. If you have low self-esteem, it is very very easy for you to feel  violated, because your self-concept is that you are so unfortunate or hurt that everyone else has to handle you with great care and hypersensitivity. Whenever this fails to happen, as of course it often does, you become angry. According to the Medical Dictionary, [2]  anger is an emotional state that may range in intensity from mild irritation to blinding rage or fury. Anger has physical effects that include:

• Accelerated heart rate,
• Higher blood pressure,

And increased levels of adrenaline and nor adrenaline.

Anger might be cause by external events or simply by your own thoughts about something. You may feel that someone has just insulted you or attacked you, or that things are just going wrong left and right. Or, you might have cause to think about someone or some problem that greatly disturbs you.
There are many things that might make us angry. We can express anger through facial expressions, body language, gestures, words,
tones of voice, or actions.

Problems Caused by Anger

Anger is a very powerful emotion. It causes people to hurt other people emotionally and sometimes even physically when they feel this way–including the ones they love.  People can lose “their temper”, that is lose control, when they are angry, and may do or say things that normally they wouldn’t and which, right away, they wish they never had, so powerful is this emotion.

Relationships may be diminished or destroyed by uncontrolled anger. You might even break certain laws pertaining to violence or destruction of property.

Often times, people who have low self-esteem express anger through passive-aggressiveness. For instance, if you have low self-esteem, you have a friend who contacts you and asks you to be at a certain place at a certain time.

You don’t want to do it, but what you do is agree to show up and then go do something else “because you forgot” or “something came up”. Then, of course, this probably makes your friend angry–and you get angry with them for being mad at you! Anger can lead to physical ailments, too.

This especially happens if you suppress your feelings. According to researchers at the University of Minnesota, suppressed anger leads to increased probability of broken families, violence within the household, and heart attacks. But it seems that perhaps it’s not the suppressed anger that causes the ailments, but rather the feelings of being out of control of the situation.

These constant feelings of not being in control apparently lead, in the long run, to a weakened immune system, high blood pressure, perhaps heart problems, and general illness. Constant anger has also been shown to cause internal acidic buildup, and this is now known to be perhaps the single major cause of cancer.

[3] Anger is number cause for problems in relationships.
If you experience anger you are likely to feel accompanying negative and painful emotions such as:

• Resentment
• Hurt
• Fear
• Betrayal

For your relationships: if you experience anger then it is likely to impact on the way that you relate to the people closest to you, since you may exhibit

• Irritated
• Sad or depressed
• Guilty
• Lack of trust
• Like striking out verbally or physically
• Getting sarcastic
• Losing your sense of humor
• Acting in an abusive or abrasive manner
• Craving a drink, a smoke or other substances that relax you
• Raising your voice
• Beginning to yell, scream, or cry

Anger and Self Esteem

Sometimes a low sense of self worth can be an underlying factor for anger or your self esteem can be damaged as anger feelings lead you to doubt yourself and feel ashamed of the ways you are acting. If you have low self esteem, you may usually don’t express it in a healthy way. You don’t know what your emotional needs are.

Important needs like feel valued, appreciated, trusted, understood, and significant.

You may also feel like others don’t think your feelings are important. So, you may over-express yourself when you are angry hoping that someone will “finally” pay attention to you.

Likewise, if you have low self-esteem, you may feel cast out, unwanted, and unattractive. You may also feel hurt by others, and so when you get angry you use this as an opportunity to hurt them.

The four Steps to Releasing Anger for Greater Self Esteem

In order to have a healthy self-esteem you need to know how to release your anger when the time is right and in the right way. We can see four basic steps to follow to do this.

STEP 1.  HAVE SELF-AWARENESS.

Let yourself acknowledge that you are angry. Do not repress it. Do not deny your anger. This may not be so simple for you if you have spent most of your life suppressing anger. Let yourself say to yourself: “Yes, I am angry, and maybe I have very
good reason to be.”

STEP 2. TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR FEELINGS OF ANGER

Observe your feelings.  Are you justified in being mad?. If you are, then you are . But if you are not, you must face that too.  Is your anger really over other feelings?, Is it that you actually feel envy?, or feel slighted?, or feel that you are not the center of somebody’s attention?.

STEP 3. DISCOVER THE REASON BEHIND YOUR ANGER

If you observe that you really have no good reason to be angry about the currente situation, then ask yourself: “What is this anger about?”.

Is this anger coming from residual feelings from your childhood?
Have you been conditioned to feel threatened by certain bahaviours or circumstances?

STEP 4. EXPRESS YOUR ANGER IN HEALTHY WAYS

You may be astonished to realize that if you express your anger, you will release it. As soon as you let go of your anger your healing begins. But, if your anger is not justified, then you should not take it out on those around you. Specially not your love ones. Instead, express your anger in a positive way. Do not smash things up, but instead write out your feelings.

1. Write out why you feel anger, and at whom, and how.
2. If you are visual, maybe you can sketch a scene expressing
3. your rage.
4. Maybe you can go hit the punching bag, or listen to angry
5. music and dance to it or just close your eyes and listen.

Always remember, however, “Do not let the sun go down on your anger”.  Anger always seeks resolution. If you have healthy self-esteem, you will be able to resolve your anger in a healthy way. Again, this does NOT mean that you let yourself be beaten down or abused or taken unfair advantage of.

But anger must be felt in the right time, in the right amount, and for the right reason, and at the right person or situation. Learn to always ask yourself if this is the case, and your self-esteem will certainly grow stronger.