WHERE DOES ANGER COME FROM?

Perhaps you can identify with Brooke.

Brooke, the mother of two preschoolers, loved her husband, Glen, an up-and-coming attorney. The couple had been married eight years. Brooke was a certified public accountant but had chosen to put her career on hold until the children started school.

"I think I made a mistake," she told me. "I don't think I am cut out to be a mother. I always wanted children, but now that I've got them, I don't like the way I treat them. And I don't like what they do to me. I don't ever remember being angry or losing my temper before I had children. I always considered myself to be in control of my emotions. But I have to admit, I have often lost it with my kids. I hate myself when I do that."

"What do you do when you lose it with the children?" I inquired.

"Different things," she said. "Sometimes I yell at them. Sometimes I spank them really hard. The other day I picked up Ginger and shook her. That really scared me. I had seen on television just the day before a report of a mother who actually killed her child by shaking her. I don't want to hurt my children. I love them, but I just lose control. I wish Glen would keep the kids and give me a break, but he is so stressed in his job that he says he doesn't feel like caring for them. I think maybe I should go back to work and let someone else take care of the children."

As I talked further with Brooke, I discovered that she was angry not only with her children's behavior but also with Glen for giving her so little help. She was angry at herself for choosing to be a fulltime mom, and ultimately she was angry with God for allowing her to be a mother. "He should have known that I wouldn't be able to handle this," she said.

By now Brooke was crying. To be honest, I felt like crying too, as I remembered the hundreds of mothers who have passed through my office over the years, feeling guilty, feeling alone, not liking their kids or themselves very much.

Then there was Rich, who came to my office well dressed, but I noticed his right foot was shoeless. I soon found out why.

"I've got to have help," he began. "I've known for a long time that my anger was getting out of control, but Saturday was the last straw. For fifteen minutes, I tried to get my lawnmower started. I checked the gas, I checked the oil, I put in a new sparkplug, and still it wouldn't start. Finally, I got so exasperated that I stepped back and kicked the thing. I broke two toes and cut a third. Sitting on the steps in pain, I said to myself, 'That was really stupid.'

"I'm embarrassed. I can't tell people what really happened, so I've been saying, 'I had an accident with a lawnmower.'

"This is not the first time I've lost my temper," he continued. "I've said some pretty nasty things to my wife and children in the past. I don't think I have ever physically abused them, but I've come close."

In the course of our conversation I discovered that Rich was highly educated, holding an MBA degree. He was married with two children, profitably employed, and owned a nice house in suburbia. Rich was an active member of his church and well respected in the community. Yet he had a habit of "blowing his cool."

Thousands of men can readily identify with Rich. Unfortunately, many of them are not as honest as he, and even fewer of them are willing to reach out for help.

Rich, with his broken toes, and Brooke, with her broken heart, are dealing with very different challenges. However, what they hold in common is the human experience of intense anger and their inability to handle it. Both knew that their anger had led them to inappropriate behavior, but neither knew what to do about it. Thus, they suffered physically and emotionally from their destructive responses to anger — and their loved ones were suffering too.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE GET ANGRY?

People of all ages and social status experience anger. Brian, a high school student, is angry at the teacher who gave him a D on his report card. Liz, Brian's teacher, is angry with her ex for failing to send the child-support checks on time. Maria, an eighty-five-year-old grandmother, is angry with her oldest son, who seldom comes to see her; her son, Alex, is angry in general because he can't find a job and feels rejected by society. Marvin, a pastor, is angry with church leadership who always shoot down his best ideas. Bethany is only three years old, but she is angry with her mother, who took away her favorite toy.

But what do we mean by anger? The dictionary describes anger as "a strong passion or emotion of displeasure, and usually antagonism, excited by a sense of injury or insult." Although we normally think of anger as an emotion, it is in reality a cluster of emotions involving the body, the mind, and the will.

And we don't sit down and say, "I think I will now experience anger." Anger is a response to some event or situation in life that causes us irritation, frustration, pain, or other displeasure. Thousands of events and situations have the potential for provoking anger. An elderly relative makes a tactless comment about your child 's weight. The guy behind you on the expressway follows too closely. A friend is always posting political rants on Facebook. Your father was always angry about something when you were growing up, and now you have trouble managing your own anger.

Anger is fed by feelings of disappointment, hurt, rejection, and embarrassment. Anger pits you against the person, place, or thing that sparked the emotion. It is the opposite of the feeling of love. Love draws you toward the person; anger sets you against the person.

But the mind is also active from the very beginning. For example, if Becky asks her husband, Tim, to mow the lawn while she takes the kids shopping, and she comes home hours later and the grass is still shaggy, she may think, If he cared, he would mow the lawn. He knows how much it means to me. I don't ask for much. What was he doing instead? What HE wanted to do. How selfish. But Tim responds inwardly, Look at everything else I've been doing! I sealed the deck, took out the garbage, and walked the dog. What does she want?

Meanwhile, Ken sits simmering in his department's conference room while Corey, his manager, tells him his numbers are down this quarter; and if he doesn't start producing, the company might have to let him go. It's because I'm over fifty, Ken thinks. They're trying to get rid of all the old guys. Corey is what, about thirty-five? What does he know?

Becky, Tim, and Ken are all experiencing strong negative emotions — in their minds. But...