The Perils and Opportunities of Anger
Counterintuitive Wisdom on the Road to Self Improvement
Do you have a blind spot? What if the road to self-improvement is a path you’re not seeing? In a recent conversation with Donald J. Robertson (author of How to Think Like Roman Emperor), I asked him to unpack his statement, “Anger is the royal road to self-improvement.”
Here’s a short clip from the conversation:
How much do you think about anger?
“There’s no emotion we ought to think harder and more clearly about than anger,” according to the philosopher Martha Nussbaum, author of Anger and Forgiveness. The Buddhists and Stoics agree that anger is a vice that must be avoided. Seneca observed, “My anger is more likely to do me more harm than your wrong.”
The Perils of Anger
In my conversation with Owen Flanagan (author of How to Do Things with Emotions), we discussed the topic of anger. According to Flanagan, “we are angrier than ever — at least angrier than I have ever seen.” We model for one another and our children a “passionate intensity” that is overly confident, narcissistically demanding, and demeaning of those with whom we disagree. In short, “how we collectively do anger needs work.”
In his book How to Be Compassionate, the Dalai Lama writes,
If a person shows anger to you, and you show anger in return, the result is disaster. If you nurse hatred, you will never be happy, even in the lap of luxury. By contrast, if you control your anger and show its opposite — love, compassion, tolerance, and patience — then not only do you remain in peace, but gradually the anger of others also will diminish.
If one accepts the notion that anger is not the path to peace. Then, what is the cause of anger? How does one avoid anger?
In his treatise On Anger, Seneca wrote that the cause of anger is the belief that we are injured; this belief, therefore, should not be lightly entertained. “We ought not to fly into a rage even when the injury appears to be open and distinct: for some false things bear the semblance of truth. We should always allow some time to elapse, for time discloses the truth.”
Similarly, in an episode on How to Be Invincible, we explored how to handle criticism and insults. Epictetus tells us to remember that it is not enough to be hit or insulted to be harmed. We must believe that we are being harmed. If someone succeeds in provoking us, realize that our mind is complicit in the provocation.
For Epictetus, this is why it is essential that we not respond impulsively to impressions and remember to take a moment before reacting. In the new book, Discipline is Destiny, Ryan Holiday explains that two words (from Epictetus) should be taken to heart and obeyed when exerting ourselves for good and restraining ourselves from evil — words that will ensure a blameless and untroubled life: “persist and resist.”
Virtue and Vice
Anger with payback as its primary or sole aim is not good, nor is anger that passes pain because I am in pain. One reason is platonic. Ethics aim at the good. Seneca uses the platonic point against Aristotle and points out that orgê — “conspicuous revenge for a conspicuous slight” — aims to do harm, which is inconsistent with the aim of ethics.
Flanagan writes,
Anger is an emotion that often expresses the ego’s demands, not the demands of justice or the other’s good; the ego doesn’t listen well, and it tends toward disdain and enacting pain. How, why, and when we do anger is a cultural matter, the result of cultural learning, including, especially, how elders model it for the young. The way we are doing anger today is not good ethically and not good instrumentally; it doesn’t get us what we want.
Nussbaum proposes that some people who aim for revenge assume, consciously or unconsciously, that they will get back what was lost — the marriage, the lost loved one, and the self before the transgression. But she points out that this is “magical thinking,” an illusion.
The Opportunities of Anger
As Donald Robertson explained (in the short Youtube clip above), there are massive opportunities for self-improvement by working with our anger. The fact that it is difficult is a good sign it’s true. We all know intuitively that the authentic road to self-improvement is a difficult path (not a life hack).
The psychologist and theologian Anthony de Mello observed,
The three most difficult things for a human being are not physical feats or intellectual achievements. They are first, returning love for hate; second, including the excluded; and third, admitting that you are wrong.
What if we make the path more complicated than it needs to be? Anthony de Mello stressed that these are the easiest things in the world if you haven’t identified with the programmed, conditioned self… with the “me,” as I have been calling it. Look behind these three reactions, and you will see an identification. Everything gets fouled up when there’s too much “me” in a situation.
You cannot see clearly. Negative emotion produced by attachment kills sensitivity, and we launch into fear and blame. — Anthony de Mello
Before you swing into action, it's essential to see things with detachment, for only detachment releases love. However, de Mello writes, “most of us wrongly assume that not having negative feelings like anger and resentment, vengeance and hate, guilt and shame means that you do nothing about a situation that calls for action. Oh no, oh no! When negative feelings come in, you go blind. Detach, and your mind will become clear and unclouded by fear or desire, and suddenly you’ll be unaffected emotionally by the situation.”
Anger and negative emotions, in general, prevent us from seeing clearly.
The Dalai Lama put it this way, “Anger, jealousy, impatience, and hatred are the real troublemakers; with them, problems cannot be solved.”
Thank you for reading; I hope you found something useful.
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