Anger, a superpower against anxiety?

To overcome his anxiety, Sam Parker tried a variety of things: meditation, yoga, and even a gratitude journal.

“All the methods I tried were based on the same assumption: the opposite of anxiety is relaxation. I thought that if I found the right method to relax, the anxiety would definitely disappear,” he told the British website The Independent .

Yet none of this managed to ease his anxieties. Why? Because “my anxiety wasn’t about a lack of serenity, but about repressed anger.”

It must be said that anger has a bad reputation.

“Whether in popular culture or academic research, anger is somewhat neglected,” laments Sam Parker, whose book Good Anger: How Rethinking Rage Can Change Our Lives has just been published, to the Guardian .

Already, as is often the case, it is a problem of language: "We confuse anger with aggression, even with violence, as if they were the same thing," he laments to the British daily.

“Even psychotherapists sometimes refuse to take on patients

who do not hide their anger.”

The British daily newspaper The Guardian

Also, “ when people say 'I never get angry,' what they mean is that they contain it very well, often to their own detriment,” Sam Parker continues to the Guardian .

“We often think that anger teaches us something about others: their excesses, their resentment, their stupidity. But more often than not, it is mainly a sign of an unmet need or a past event.”

In addition, during their socialization, young girls and women generally learn to swallow their anger and remain calm, adds the Guardian journalist.

“Many told Parker that their instinctive reaction to too much anger is to cry. For those who have to deal with the stereotype of the aggressive Black woman, the anger is even harder to manage. ”

And even though boys generally feel more entitled to vent their anger, "they don't learn to ask themselves where it comes from, or what to do with it," Parker laments.

“In fact, if I was able to free myself from my generalized anxiety disorder, it was mainly thanks to therapy: one day, I understood that my mental health problems were due to decades spent repressing and stifling

my anger.”

Sam Parker at the British website The Independent

So, how do we do it? Already, Sam Parker reminds us that anger is a neutral emotion, intended to protect us, inform us and set us in motion.

“It's important to understand that its purpose is to 'push us to make the change we need,' " adds Isabel Berwick, quoting Parker's book in the British newspaper Financial Times . It is intended, in the author's words, "for all those who bend over backward for others and avoid conflict at all costs."

“Sam invites us to ride the wave of energy that accompanies anger, because it is always a warning of one of three things: a violation of our boundaries, an unmet need

or an injury.”

Isabel Berwick in the British daily Financial Times.

What worked for Sam was boxing. But sports in general can be the perfect outlet for emotion.

“Once you get past the peak of anger, you can make a much more informed decision if change is needed,” Sam told the Guardian . “Sometimes you also have to have the conversations you dread and talk about the things that make you upset.”

“When I feel angry, the anxiety subsides,” he confesses. “And if, like me, you’ve had to learn this superpower, it can change your life.”

And it is a more useful method than silence or flight.—