Anger/rage is technically not an emotion; rather it's a protective reaction to a sensed fear or threat. Let me state that again: rage isn't truly an emotion; it’s a protective reaction to a sensed hurt or threat. Consider it; have you ever gotten mad about something that on some level didn't feel threatening to you? Somebody cuts you off, somebody tells you to do something you don't wish to do, a loved one sounds out or does something that feels controlling or simply plain mean. All of these situations may be felt as threatening. And when threatened, our inherent aptitude is to protect ourselves or something really bad may happen to us. That‘s where anger, rage and aggression come in. Once we think of anger we commonly think of the actions we see on the surface - for instance, your body tenses, you may shout, throw things or get violent. All the same, this is really more of a definition of rage than anger.
Anger and rage is not the same thing. You are able to be angry without being in a rage. Reviewing your own experiences you'll without doubt discover times where you got angry and dealt with it in an unaggressive way (e.g. Refusing the urge to hit your boss as you'd lose your job). Anger is an emotion that's normal to all of us. Commonly, it’s an alarm that something is wrong. Utilize that signal the correct way and it may be your friend. Utilize it the improper way and its trouble. It’s good to release anger. It takes an tremendous amount of energy to hold rage inside and it may eventually lead to hypertension, diabetes, gastric reflux, heart condition, cancer and a whole cluster of additional things you likely don‘t wish to have.
