Is Your Anger Anxiety
As I tell my students, just because you know what something is it does not mean that you know how it manifests. This is common in cases which present in the first instance to me as anger management work. Now, it is true that for the majority of these cases the issue is clear cut, the person is overly expressing anger and having difficulty in controlling it.
However, in more and more cases the anger being presented is not anger at all. It is a manifestation of anxiety which presents itself as anger. For many people, men in particular, anger is seen as an appropriate emotion to express. Because of this, many emotions get lumped in with anger. I know a person in my personal life who expressed concern as anger, love as anger, sadness as anger, well you get the idea. For him, anger was the only appropriate emotion for men to have and he just generalised all emotion under that banner.
It is important for all of us to truly understand what are emotions are and what they are meant to represent. If we know this, it will make the therapeutic process much easier and time efficient. So ask yourself if you are angry today, is it really anger or maybe it is a bit of anxiety creeping in.
