Workout 1 Managing Anger
3 Action Points
Count the cost of the anger. Consider the general cost of anger (in comparison to Achilles’ anger) and the specific costs of your own anger.
Replace the negative with the positive. In line with the advice given in the Iliad, replace the anger you feel with “friendliness, kindness, and gentle mindedness.”
Parallel practice anger by embracing the opposite of what you desire. Practice dealing with or managing the negative by practicing a positive.
Summary of the Flow of Workout 1 Managing Anger
Workout 1 centers on anger management. After a brief word on management (literally, taking something in hand, such as a horse or child), we’ll consider anger itself before looking at how we can manage or deal with anger both directly and indirectly.
We’ll begin by observing what happens when we don’t deal with or manage anger. In doing so, we’ll count the cost of anger—both its general cost (using Achilles’ anger as an example) and its specific cost (remembering a time we were angry).
Next, following the advice of Odysseus and others in the Iliad, we’ll learn to “replace the negative with the positive”—that is, harmful anger with helpful “friendliness, kindness, and gentle mindedness.”
To practice this replacement (of the harmful negative with the helpful positive), we’ll write a postcard (an imaginary one) to someone we were once angry with. In doing so, we’ll contemplate what positive emotion, thought, or action we could have substituted in place of our anger.
Finally, we’ll parallel practice managing anger. Parallel practice is indirect practice. It enables us to practice dealing with or managing a desire or emotion such as anger when we don’t actually feel the desire or emotion. Consequently, when we do feel them, we are better able to deal with or manage them. Don’t worry, we’ll go into parallel practice more and give a handful of practice ideas.
To see Workout 1 Managing Anger in whole, click "Go to PDF."
Best of benefits in practicing! The Cave.