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Growing up in a dysfunctional family, I had a lot of anger that stole away parts of my life. Anger wasn't alone at fault, but surely a demon that was there. One

Growing up in a dysfunctional family, I had a lot of anger that stole away parts of my life. Anger wasn't alone at fault, but surely a demon that was there. One thing that hit me hard, while I was already on my healing journey was a saying at a monastery: "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." This saying is supposed to be from Buddha's teachings. I remember having an immediate talk with my friend, almost breaking down, thinking about all the years behind that I have been trying to tame this.

peoplefromibiza 2y ago
that's simply because we live in societies that punish anger, instead of treating it like we treat any other emotion. "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." bu also: "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished for making other people angry too." EDIT: proof is if I say anger is normal, it's not good or bad it's just part of what we are, it's simply that our societies that are based on the fiction of the merciful god - especially in the US - have decided to treat it like a bug in the system, there are some fluctuations in the votes that this comment receives. If I said the same thing about sadness or fear or joy or surprise, nobody would have found it controversial. Even though sadness kills a lot of people every year (and fear makes people angry, many angry people are simply scared).
- cafard 2y ago
  Punish anger? A lot of people make a career out of anger, even if it sometimes appears to be simulated.
  - xattt 2y ago
    Similar to “puritanical” suppression of sexuality in the US general population, people who make a living out of anger are literally making anger porn.
  - peoplefromibiza 2y ago
    punish here means it is widely considered a bad trait, that must be expelled, like a demonic possession. If you are angry, there's something wrong with you, it can't possibly be that there are often times good reasons to be angry. Anger plays a big role in what we humans are, just like fear, sadness or joy. > A lot of people make a career out of anger A lot of people make careers out of being good at killing or at criminal behavior in general, doesn't mean that societies encourage it.
    - theGnuMe 2y ago
      The root cause of anger is fear.
      - peoplefromibiza 2y ago
        correct! I wrote in the edit of the original comment (and fear makes people angry, many angry people are simply scared) Yet nobody thinks that fear is bad or should be eradicated from society or you should take fear management classes if you're scared.
  - NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
    Sure, some people make a career out of it. Radio hosts (now mostly moving online). But they're the "safe outlet" for people to listen to who do not get to express anger themselves because of punishment. The last 3 or 4 years we've even seen the creation of new slang to punish angry people ("Karens"). Police are ever more ready to truly, in the proper sense of the word, punish those who are doing little more than just being angry. I would think that if we could easily quantify anger, then measure protests over the years, we'd discover that as time goes on they get less angry. Hell, some of them today seem almost depressed and despondent. Maybe punishing anger is a good thing. But we shouldn't pretend we're not doing it.
bowsamic 2y ago
On the other hand, this kind of teaching was very destructive to me: I was taught it was shameful to be angry, and my main religious experience was with Buddhism, which says anger is always purely bad. Of course everyone has anger, and so did I, but because I was shameful of feeling it I just expressed it back on myself as intense depression and self loathing There are two sides to every teaching. The Buddhas teaching may be touted as universal by the doctrine of the teaching itself, but for me it was destructive. Though as always I await a chorus of followers to tell me I was “doing it wrong”
- kybernetikos 2y ago
  I don't get very angry generally, but this is something that I consider a mild fault. There are some things and situations where the appropriate thing is to be angry (injustice, harming innocents, etc). Of course, many people let their anger push them to behave badly, but the anger itself can be appropriate and can even help you take actions that need to be taken. From the Christian tradition, Psalms 4:4 is sometimes translated "In your anger, do not sin". Anger by itself is not necessarily sin, but what people do with their anger often is.
  - mrweasel 2y ago
    Anger doesn't really come natural to me, so I get very confused when others fail to control their anger. I do get frustrated, which seems different to me. That is something I can now easily deal with, after learning about children and emotion. Most of the time it's down to "broken cookie syndrome", i.e. children breaking down in tears do to a cookie breaking in half. It's rarely about the cookie, it's something else and the cookie is just the straw that broke the camels back. Always thinking "broken cookie" when frustrations bubble up makes it a lot easier to not lash out at people around you and instead address the underlying issues.
  - bowsamic 2y ago
    I totally agree. My therapist taught me that sometimes we need to be angry, or at least seem angry, when someone does something wrong, an injustice as you point out. I’m not sure why people have come to the conclusion that certain emotions must be entirely avoided
rsyring 2y ago
Well, since we're talking religion, here's another take: > Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil (Ephesians 4:26). And some additional reading of interested: https://www.ccef.org/be-angry-and-do-not-sin https://www.ccef.org/be-angry-and-do-not-sin
- mtalantikite 2y ago
  Thanks for sharing this! I actually think it's the same take, as Buddhism teaches that there are skillful and unskillful ways to relate to all things that arise, with anger being one of the five main categories (kleshas) [1][2]. It's never to attempt to block those emotions, but to let them arise, look at them directly, and understand how to relate with them skillfully. One of the teachings is that all things come from love, but it's just that it's often filtered through our ignorance which causes us to act unskillfully. A Tibetan teacher liked to say that westerners think that Buddhism is all calm and peaceful, and that compassion is soft and gentle, but when we're talking about waking up to the true nature of reality a slap in the face could be an act of compassion. It's just that most of us aren't awake enough to judge when a slap is compassionate, so we should probably not do that at the beginning of the path! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Tath%C4%81gatas#Elements_of_the_Five_Families https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Tath%C4%81gatas#Elements_... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kleshas_(Buddhism)#Five_poisons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kleshas_(Buddhism)#Five_poison...
  - mablopoule 2y ago
    > A Tibetan teacher liked to say that westerners think that Buddhism is all calm and peaceful, and that compassion is soft and gentle The excellent Youtube Channel "Religion for Breakfast" touched on this subject toward the end of his "Buddhism Has a Lot of Hells" video[1], where he explained that it's a case of orientalism (in the 'Edward Saïd' sense). In this case, since Buddhism was mostly imported in the west by hippy-style counter-culture movements, and since it was presented as an alternative to judeo-christian values, there was a tendency to omit things (like the concept of hell and damnation) that wasn't deemed foreign (to western culture) enough. If one is interested in the history of religion, then I heartily recommend both "Religion for Breakfast" and "Let's talk Religion" Youtube Channels, they are truly amazing both in breadth and in quality. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKWmMLlSPsM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKWmMLlSPsM
hosh 2y ago
> "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." That's exactly the Six Realms conception of hell beings. They are not in Naraka because they had done something bad and being punished for it, so much as, being consumed by anger, wanting to punish others, leaves them in a place of living in hell. There is both "hot" Naraka and "cold" Naraka, just as anger can run hot or cold.
blueyes 2y ago
One of problems with trying to discuss a word like anger, which has lots of meanings, is that people talk past each other, as many are doing in this discussion. There are different kinds of anger. I have not doubt that some are useful, some are damaging, and some are both at the same time. I think one kind of anger that can be particularly damaging is cited in the parent comment here. It's a chronic anger that was formed in childhood and accompanies a person through life looking for new threats, targets, and sources of outrage. I've known people holding that kind of anger, I've also been that person at least sometimes, and yes it's damaging to oneself and others. Profoundly maladaptive. A way to sabotage yourself, your relationships and your livelihood. That's a chronic anger. But there are other forms of anger that might be momentary, and come up when something is going wrong that should be stopped. Maybe anger is the wrong term, but I'm talking about a sense of "this is wrong, and I'm going to intervene now." Sure, that can misfire, but it can also be useful and prevent a lot of harm.
- sshine 2y ago
  I recognise the chronic anger just looking for places to manifest. And while I could justify it as a source of ventilation at work, I’d be more combative at home after work. It’s fine to have learned to get angry when witnessing injustice. Sometimes it is the best solution to be loud and noisy. And sometimes scaring a person is the only solution I know. In a gestalt session at an anger management therapist, I told myself that there is always better solutions, I just don’t always know them yet.
riku_iki 2y ago
> "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." another take is that in competitive and adversarial society, anger is natural response to outside hostile action, and the goal is to use it as a source of focus to push back on hostility, but in calculated and cold blooded way. Anger releases lots of hormones which could be very useful in difficult situation if one can control himself.

peoplefromibiza 2y ago

that's simply because we live in societies that punish anger, instead of treating it like we treat any other emotion. "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." bu also: "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished for making other people angry too." EDIT: proof is if I say anger is normal, it's not good or bad it's just part of what we are, it's simply that our societies that are based on the fiction of the merciful god - especially in the US - have decided to treat it like a bug in the system, there are some fluctuations in the votes that this comment receives. If I said the same thing about sadness or fear or joy or surprise, nobody would have found it controversial. Even though sadness kills a lot of people every year (and fear makes people angry, many angry people are simply scared).

cafard 2y ago
Punish anger? A lot of people make a career out of anger, even if it sometimes appears to be simulated.
- xattt 2y ago
  Similar to “puritanical” suppression of sexuality in the US general population, people who make a living out of anger are literally making anger porn.
- peoplefromibiza 2y ago
  punish here means it is widely considered a bad trait, that must be expelled, like a demonic possession. If you are angry, there's something wrong with you, it can't possibly be that there are often times good reasons to be angry. Anger plays a big role in what we humans are, just like fear, sadness or joy. > A lot of people make a career out of anger A lot of people make careers out of being good at killing or at criminal behavior in general, doesn't mean that societies encourage it.
  - theGnuMe 2y ago
    The root cause of anger is fear.
    - peoplefromibiza 2y ago
      correct! I wrote in the edit of the original comment (and fear makes people angry, many angry people are simply scared) Yet nobody thinks that fear is bad or should be eradicated from society or you should take fear management classes if you're scared.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
  Sure, some people make a career out of it. Radio hosts (now mostly moving online). But they're the "safe outlet" for people to listen to who do not get to express anger themselves because of punishment. The last 3 or 4 years we've even seen the creation of new slang to punish angry people ("Karens"). Police are ever more ready to truly, in the proper sense of the word, punish those who are doing little more than just being angry. I would think that if we could easily quantify anger, then measure protests over the years, we'd discover that as time goes on they get less angry. Hell, some of them today seem almost depressed and despondent. Maybe punishing anger is a good thing. But we shouldn't pretend we're not doing it.

bowsamic 2y ago

On the other hand, this kind of teaching was very destructive to me: I was taught it was shameful to be angry, and my main religious experience was with Buddhism, which says anger is always purely bad. Of course everyone has anger, and so did I, but because I was shameful of feeling it I just expressed it back on myself as intense depression and self loathing There are two sides to every teaching. The Buddhas teaching may be touted as universal by the doctrine of the teaching itself, but for me it was destructive. Though as always I await a chorus of followers to tell me I was “doing it wrong”

kybernetikos 2y ago
I don't get very angry generally, but this is something that I consider a mild fault. There are some things and situations where the appropriate thing is to be angry (injustice, harming innocents, etc). Of course, many people let their anger push them to behave badly, but the anger itself can be appropriate and can even help you take actions that need to be taken. From the Christian tradition, Psalms 4:4 is sometimes translated "In your anger, do not sin". Anger by itself is not necessarily sin, but what people do with their anger often is.
- mrweasel 2y ago
  Anger doesn't really come natural to me, so I get very confused when others fail to control their anger. I do get frustrated, which seems different to me. That is something I can now easily deal with, after learning about children and emotion. Most of the time it's down to "broken cookie syndrome", i.e. children breaking down in tears do to a cookie breaking in half. It's rarely about the cookie, it's something else and the cookie is just the straw that broke the camels back. Always thinking "broken cookie" when frustrations bubble up makes it a lot easier to not lash out at people around you and instead address the underlying issues.
- bowsamic 2y ago
  I totally agree. My therapist taught me that sometimes we need to be angry, or at least seem angry, when someone does something wrong, an injustice as you point out. I’m not sure why people have come to the conclusion that certain emotions must be entirely avoided

rsyring 2y ago

Well, since we're talking religion, here's another take: > Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil (Ephesians 4:26). And some additional reading of interested: https://www.ccef.org/be-angry-and-do-not-sin https://www.ccef.org/be-angry-and-do-not-sin

mtalantikite 2y ago
Thanks for sharing this! I actually think it's the same take, as Buddhism teaches that there are skillful and unskillful ways to relate to all things that arise, with anger being one of the five main categories (kleshas) [1][2]. It's never to attempt to block those emotions, but to let them arise, look at them directly, and understand how to relate with them skillfully. One of the teachings is that all things come from love, but it's just that it's often filtered through our ignorance which causes us to act unskillfully. A Tibetan teacher liked to say that westerners think that Buddhism is all calm and peaceful, and that compassion is soft and gentle, but when we're talking about waking up to the true nature of reality a slap in the face could be an act of compassion. It's just that most of us aren't awake enough to judge when a slap is compassionate, so we should probably not do that at the beginning of the path! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Tath%C4%81gatas#Elements_of_the_Five_Families https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Tath%C4%81gatas#Elements_... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kleshas_(Buddhism)#Five_poisons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kleshas_(Buddhism)#Five_poison...
- mablopoule 2y ago
  > A Tibetan teacher liked to say that westerners think that Buddhism is all calm and peaceful, and that compassion is soft and gentle The excellent Youtube Channel "Religion for Breakfast" touched on this subject toward the end of his "Buddhism Has a Lot of Hells" video[1], where he explained that it's a case of orientalism (in the 'Edward Saïd' sense). In this case, since Buddhism was mostly imported in the west by hippy-style counter-culture movements, and since it was presented as an alternative to judeo-christian values, there was a tendency to omit things (like the concept of hell and damnation) that wasn't deemed foreign (to western culture) enough. If one is interested in the history of religion, then I heartily recommend both "Religion for Breakfast" and "Let's talk Religion" Youtube Channels, they are truly amazing both in breadth and in quality. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKWmMLlSPsM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKWmMLlSPsM

hosh 2y ago

> "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." That's exactly the Six Realms conception of hell beings. They are not in Naraka because they had done something bad and being punished for it, so much as, being consumed by anger, wanting to punish others, leaves them in a place of living in hell. There is both "hot" Naraka and "cold" Naraka, just as anger can run hot or cold.

blueyes 2y ago

One of problems with trying to discuss a word like anger, which has lots of meanings, is that people talk past each other, as many are doing in this discussion. There are different kinds of anger. I have not doubt that some are useful, some are damaging, and some are both at the same time. I think one kind of anger that can be particularly damaging is cited in the parent comment here. It's a chronic anger that was formed in childhood and accompanies a person through life looking for new threats, targets, and sources of outrage. I've known people holding that kind of anger, I've also been that person at least sometimes, and yes it's damaging to oneself and others. Profoundly maladaptive. A way to sabotage yourself, your relationships and your livelihood. That's a chronic anger. But there are other forms of anger that might be momentary, and come up when something is going wrong that should be stopped. Maybe anger is the wrong term, but I'm talking about a sense of "this is wrong, and I'm going to intervene now." Sure, that can misfire, but it can also be useful and prevent a lot of harm.

sshine 2y ago
I recognise the chronic anger just looking for places to manifest. And while I could justify it as a source of ventilation at work, I’d be more combative at home after work. It’s fine to have learned to get angry when witnessing injustice. Sometimes it is the best solution to be loud and noisy. And sometimes scaring a person is the only solution I know. In a gestalt session at an anger management therapist, I told myself that there is always better solutions, I just don’t always know them yet.

riku_iki 2y ago

> "You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger." another take is that in competitive and adversarial society, anger is natural response to outside hostile action, and the goal is to use it as a source of focus to push back on hostility, but in calculated and cold blooded way. Anger releases lots of hormones which could be very useful in difficult situation if one can control himself.