A free newsletter from Choosing Therapy for those interested in mental health issues and fighting the stigma. Get helpful tips and the latest information. Sign Up that dam it up. Victims of these exaggerations or accumulations may transfer a lifelong rage at their mothers to their wives or husbands. Others may become terribly bitter and cynical and spend a lifetime splattering everyone and everything with a loosened fund of old slush. Still others turn their anger from its actual and appropriate direction to themselves and become full of selfhate and suffer serious depression. Some with extraordinary irrational belief splash the slush bank onto others to the point of delusion, fear, and paranoid ideas ("Others want to kill m e " ) . Of course, there are different degrees of putting it on as well as different degrees of inappropriateness. At times the victim will direct his selfhate to other people. At other times he will swear that other people hate him, here again projecting his self-hate. If the degree of selfhate and distortion is great enough, he may suffer from paranoid delusions—feeling that other people want to hurt or kill him. Most cases are not this severe but are still very destructive. In any case, the main intent, conscious or unconscious, is to shift anger to the least threatening person, thing, event, or situation. (Thus a man dissatisfied with his job may chronically find fault with the w a y his wife keeps their home.) This is an attempt to maintain his working ability. Of course failure always stalks on-

Mindfulness for Anger Management: Transformative Skills for Overcoming Anger and Managing Powerful EmotionsTwisting It: The Assorted Poisons 129 anonymous, just another driver, and he needn't fear any assault on his nice-guy status. But he and his car are one, and together they become a formidable instrument of vengeance. On the road they can strike out for every bit of hurt pride ever experienced. Together they can attempt to exact vindictive triumph for every seeming wrong ever inflicted on Mr. Nice Guy. That he doesn't know his enemy (other cars and drivers) makes it so much easier for him to switch to them all kinds of feeling about other people (from home, for example). What's more, he can go on being ostensibly peace loving. How much easier to work out sibling rivalry, feelings of sexual inadequacy, inability to stand up to the boss or to a castrating wife or mother —and all the anger these produce—on the well-populated road where he is anonymous. I feel very strongly that a great many automobile accidents occur because persons suffering from much perversion of anger, from bursting slush funds, bring it to cars and roads, where it overflows. This is an environment in which people often feel one way but act another way. When they are angry, they smile sweetly or freeze and do nothing at all. In any case, there is a paucity of straight, honest, simply and readily definable expressions of feelings. In this environment, there is sometimes a serious dearth of strong feelings, often to the point of emotional vacuum. Usually what look like appropriate, strong emotional responses are actually superficial, hysterical, manipulative outbursts turned on and off like summer showers. These serve to confuse further and to subvert real feelings. This is an environment in which hysteria may suddenly give way to inhibition and even to paralysis of emotional expression. In this atmosphere small issues will evoke large displays and large issues will evoke nothing. This atmosphere will be marked by many intricate inconsistencies that the child can't possibly understand. This will be particularly so with anger and may result in an avoidance of anger and subsequent crippling in this very important emotional area. In effect, the victim will be told the following: "It is all right for me to get angry in this circumstance but not you." "Sometimes it is all right for you to get angry, but sometimes you can't, even though the circumstances are identical. It all depends on my mood -- which there is no way of knowing." "Why can't you be like me -- I never get angry, but when I do, I don't show it. All I do is get cold and sullen and withdraw my attention and affection from you." "If you get angry, I'll know you don't love me." "Nice boys and girls don't get angry -- especially at adults." "If you must get angry, at least be polite." "If you get angry, you will not be liked." "If you continue to get angry, you will surely get into great trouble." "Civilized people don't get angry, but if you get angry I'll have to tell Daddy, and he will get angry and will have to punish you when he gets home." His old feud with George Warleggan still flares – as does the illicit love between Morwenna and Drake, Demelza's brother.

Perversions This part of The Angry Book describes the allimportant ways in which we pervert the normal, natural free feel and flow of anger. These are the principal methods we use to contribute to the slush fund of perverted emotions. Perverted anger provides a reservoir of emotional slush that poisons one's system and leads to all kinds of emotional infections. 9 This mechanism works on the principle of thinking that if you delay anger long enough, maybe it will go away. Well, it doesn't! It goes into the slush fund. The victim of putting it off delays feeling anger and responding to it, either unconsciously, consciously, or both. This is the person w h o generally puts off problems, conflicts, decisions, responsibility, and doing whatever has to be done. He feels that if it doesn't go away, at least there may come a time when it will be safer to feel, to express, and to do. Actually his slush fund builds up, produces various "poisons," becomes full to the point of explosion, and makes him feel less and less capable of handling his angry feelings. This contributes still further to his putting it off and thus builds a very vicious circle. Even if he should experience Debbie Horsfield From the incomparable Winston Graham . . . who has everything that anyone else has, then a whole lot more.

Where there is anxiety there is bound to be depression and vice versa. I have never seen clinical evidence of depression without signs of concomitant raw anxiety. Depression may be mild or severe, acute, or chronic, periodic (in regular on-and-off phases) or sporadic. It has a cause, but the cause may be elusive and impossible to discern. Depression is always painful and destructive, sometimes to the point of paralysis. It may completely destroy one's ability to function and rob one of every semblance of happiness. Depression, however, is not always severe and incapacitating. It can also be subtle and chronic—so chronic, in fact, that its victim may have no awareness that he is depressed. I have seen patients who have been depressed for so many years that they forgot what it is like to feel otherwise. Only at their first sign of getting Twisting It: The Assorted Poisons 65 aware of "uneasy feelings" at "different times" or with "certain people" or in "certain circumstances." Not all of us need professional help. But with improved "angry insight" we can all gain and grow and become easier, freer, and happier people. Parents in this environment will very often produce what is known as a double-bind situation which goes like this: "Don't hold it in -- I can't stand when you do -- let it out! But when you let it out, I will hit you for being disrespectful." This damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't approach promotes severe conflict, much anxiety, great angry problems, and emotional paralysis.

When you lose your temper honestly, it can be good for you. In this perennially bestselling book, eminent psychiatrist and bestselling author Dr. Theodore Isaac Rubin shows how one of the most powerful human emotions can change your life. Suppressed or twisted anger can lead to anxiety, depression, insomnia, psychosomatic illness, alcoholism, frigidity, impotence, and downright misery. But understanding and releasing anger can lead to greater health, happiness, and emotional wholeness. The Anger Workbook for Women: How to Keep Your Anger from Undermining Your Self-Esteem, Your Emotional Balance, and Your Relationships Savers are the victims of long-term poison. They are special "don't-make-wavers" who spend a lifetime twisting perverted anger into a cancerous, poisonous smoke screen. These are the (unconscious and sometimes not-so-unconscious) keepers of permanent gripe lists. T h e y often operate on a supersweet-talk basis, too. In any case, their relationship with people remains an essentially dishonest one. Most savers see themselves, not as enormous gatherers of anger, but rather as beleaguered, misunderstood, "understanding" martyrs. On the basis of this martyrdom, they feel they deserve all kinds of special consideration and undying love. W h e n these aren't forthcoming they feel they have been unjustly treated—and they get angry, turn it off, save it, and feel even more martyred. They are the great injustice collec- Freezing it—removing one's self from what one feels by whatever means and measures, that is, perverting and deadening one's feelings—may well be considered the total measure of emotional pathology or neurosis in a human being. putters. The on-putter in fact is one of the most flagrant destroyers of human relationships. He is dishonestly and inappropriately "nice" at the wrong times, and he is consistently and inappropriately angry nearly all the rest of the time —inevitably putting a great strain on all his relationships, often to the point of utter destruction.Such sleep serves as a self-imposed general anesthesia. W h e n people suffering from insomnia or oversleeping are finally put in touch with their anger, the beneficial results can be very dramatic and gratifying to behold. It sometimes takes considerable time for them to know that they are angry, to accept their anger, and to express it and live it through with feeling. But w h e n they do, the relief that follows is dramatic indeed. I remember a woman I saw in treatment w h o spent at least ten years sleeping about two hours a night. This in itself had a terribly debilitating and depressing effect. She said that the worst part of her not sleeping was that terrible thoughts popped into her head as she lay in bed. For a long time she refused to describe these thoughts and could not even entertain the idea that feelings associated with these thoughts were keeping her awake. After we had established a close and trusting relationship and she was certain that I would not "judge her harshly," she revealed the thoughts of her sleepless nights. They involved visual fantasies of terrible things happening to her mother and sister. As treatment progressed, she realized that she had a severe problem with anger and especially anger toward loved ones. Alter a while she became aware of ancient (stemming from Talkiatry – Feel Like You Can’t Talk About It? Virtual Psychiatry Can Help. Virtual mental health care from doctors who take insurance. Visit Talkiatry Overcoming Anger in Your Relationship: How to Break the Cycle of Arguments, Put-Downs, and Stony Silences There are two main imitations of anger. They are both poisons and are particularly insidious because they look like the real thing. They are at best synthetic products and stunted forms that do not bring real relief to their users. They further serve to confuse whoever it is they are directed at—usually children. Talking about it is the process of talking about and all around anger but not feeling it (for real, on a completely involved, fully aware l e v e l ) , and of course not conveying the feeling of it. This is usually a more or less completely intellectual process in which words about become a substitute for the real thing. The people who make use of this process often know that they are supposed to get angry and act accordingly—but all that comes through is words or play-acting. I remember sitting in a small play- this particular patient suffered from a psychosomatic condition sometimes found in this kind of killing-mama dream. T h e patient was a teethgrinder and as a result had a rather serious periodontal condition necessitating much gum treatment. With some people, dreaming does not offer enough relief and there is an overflow into the waking hours. Many are embarrassed by enormously hostile fantasies in which a loved one or a close friend is suddenly dying, being torn apart, crushed, and so on. This is a relatively common kind of peculiar thought, the result of the distortion and snowballing of repressed anger. When these thoughts are close to a truthful revelation, they sometimes produce panic, which may lead the way to treatment. Hostile fantasies and dreams both tend to disappear as the individual learns to handle anger realistically and effectively. T h e patient inevitably learns, among other things, that love and anger are not mutually exclusive and that it is quite normal to get angry at loved ones. But more about this in Part 4.

vicious, vulgar, often disgusting, and always destructive. They are designed to sneak in and dissipate enormous rage under the guise of entertainment and good fellowship. They are always the antithesis of either warm, healthy humor or warm, healthy anger. More often than not, they are a crashing bore, and the boredom itself is a very effective form of vindictive hostility. Indeed, the compulsive joker who is running out of jokes may turn to the poison blood brother—boring. I feel that chronic bores— people who insist on telling you personal details of their lives or things that you already know and they know you know—are actually engaging in a form of torture. Compulsive jokers are particularly good at this form of torture through boredom. I remember one patient who was a compulsive joker. After we worked on this awhile, he switched to boring. When I pointed this out, thus cutting off another poison outlet, he had quite a reaction. Real hot anger was spewn all over the place—undiluted and undisguised. This was followed by tears, then relief, then real hard work on some very important personality problems. This kind of reaction is understandable when one considers the enormous amount of slush—just beneath the surface—necessary to keep a chronic jokester joking and boring. Those of us who are physiologically whole are born with the potential to feel and to express anger. But the things that make us angry and the ways we feel and the things we do when we are angry are not the same for all of us. The particular, individual ways in which we respond are learned. Generally, no one sits down and gives us lessons. We learn in more effective ways -- starting from the moment we are born. larly insidious because the victim continues to see himself as a "nice, mind-your-own-business, don't-make-waves" type, while his slush fund grows and the pus and its poisons spread— without any awareness on his part. Of course he has symptoms of all kinds. However, his total success at cheating himself of awareness of anger prevents him from connecting symptoms with putting-down. Perhaps you know people w h o use automatic putting-down to a great extent. These are some of the typical statements they make: "Me, I just never get angry." "There's just nothing important enough to get angry about." "Yes, I can see that he's arrogant, vindictive, and a cheat and a liar, but it just has no effect on me." "Can't be bothered." "I couldn't care less." T h e second kind of putting it down occurs with completely conscious awareness. Here the victim knows that he is angry and even feels like reacting or responding in an angry way. But like all slush-accumulating victims, he also feels that he has a vested interest in not feeling or showing anger—let alone not getting angry with anybody else. So, he works hard at not being angry or at least at being only minimally angry if he can't obliterate the feeling altogether. This conscious putting anger down does permit the victim at least some awareness ofways hurt from chronic clenching. It was almost as if he had to keep his jaws closed tight lest the real truth somehow emerge in an unguarded moment. T h e fatigue here is not imagined. It is very real indeed. Just imagine how tired you would be if you kept your body in a constant state of censored, guarded tension. Interestingly, some of the victims of this poison complain of severe cramping in various muscles, and some have been treated for "poor circulation." I know one man who used to chew a hole through a pipe stem at least once a week—until much of his tension and anger were rerouted through healthier channels. potential. We also know people who do well for a while and then somehow but inevitably manage to lose all the profits of their efforts on a "good deal" that turns out to be a disaster. Have you known any severe alcoholics, drug addicts, or chronic gamblers? Obsessive gambling and alcoholism are complicated illnesses, but think of the self-hate involved that literally drags a man into the gutter. I have interviewed gamblers who feel relieved of tension only after they have lost eveiything and are absolutely ruined. T h e list obviously goes on and on. Self-sabotage can be acute or chronic, subtle or blatant, mild or severe enough to result in loss of life (there are people who insist on working in disaster areas or as daredevils). Self-sabotage often has many roots and can be extraordinarily complicated. But I have yet to see a case that was not fed by perverted anger, and I have seen cases in which self-hate was the prime motivating force. ual closeness, often takes place with great satisfaction. L e t me say that healthy adult sexual activity requires mutual closeness and trust. ("You really care for me" has meaning, as does "I love you.") Slush-funders are in a very poor position for either closeness or trust. T h e y may not know that they are angry, but they are simply not at ease and are never completely themselves in relation to anyone else. This is especially true of sex, which represents the potential for the greatest closeness of all. Therefore it is not at all surprising that the sexual area becomes a poisoned one and that sexual poisons abound. W h a t about compulsive overworking? Here again there is a boundless variety of psychological dynamics or roots. T h e particularly large slush-funders who are overworkers are very similar to my handball player. They use working as a way of "working off" all feelings, among them anger. I had one patient who was a very wealthy man but a compulsive worker—to the point of eighteen hours a day. It became more and more apparent as time went on that he funneled all his emotions into and through his work. His total outlook was unilateral—work. He came to see me because his wife threatened to leave him. A few interesting things became apparent. There were times when he described