Controlling Anger

Earlier today, there was a news story about a woman in Pennsylvania who received a prison sentence of 5 to 10 years, basically for losing her temper and doing a most unthinkable thing. While having a fight with her boyfriend, as they were physically hitting each other, she picked up her own 4-month old baby and used it as a club to strike out at the boyfriend, fracturing the baby's soft skull. First she pleaded guilty, then retracted it, and was then convicted of more crimes than she would have been if she'd stuck with her original guilty plea. Her reasoning for changing her mind was that, according to her, she didn't realize what she was doing when she picked up her baby and swung at her boyfriend; she'd gotten so angry that she lost control of her mind and thoughts and just reacted. Obviously, the jury didn't care.

There seems to be more and more incidences like this occurring across the world these days, as the availability of drugs and weapons, and some of the general breakdowns in deportment, come together to create what seems like there's been a loss of common sense. In the past week, we've had a shooting at a mall in one state, a shooting at a religious training facility and a church, and another murder suicide where a man killed his entire family and then took his own life. We know that in the first case the man had lost his job and his girlfriend and was angry, and in the second case the man had been thrown out of the training facility; we can only speculate what happened in the domestic situation.

Truthfully, I do and don't understand this loss of control when one gets really angry. I'm normally pretty steady, but I've been known to lose my temper here and there, though I never yell or scream. I've been known to react to stupid things in my past physically, but never towards anyone else. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I've always had that kill switch that has kept me from doing something that I knew I would regret later; I always found a way to not only stop, but do something that would be way more appropriate and get the point across without getting myself fired, thrown in jail, or possibly killed. Because, in today's world, one never knows who's armed and who's not.

To tell on myself for a quick moment, I remember many years ago, the only time I ever almost lost total control of myself. I was a couple of days from turning 40, and stress was my friend. We were implementing a new computer system, and I was working 14 to 16 hour days. And I was getting sick, with a bad cold that turned out to be strep. I was in my office because, up until that time, I had never taken a sick day, and I wasn't taking one on this day, when I had one of my employees give me some news about an event that was supposed to take place that I hadn't heard about. I went out, met with the people who were about to do something, and told them they weren't doing it. I had the authority to tell them no; they told me someone with a higher authority told them they had to do it. I told them it wasn't happening, and if this person had a problem with it to have him call me.

This man did call me, told me it was happening, and that was that. I told him it wasn't happening because it was in a heavily used confidential area that I was in control of, that I hadn't been consulted on the project, and that I wasn't going to allow anyone to do anything in that area, at least until it got addressed in a meeting where I had an opportunity to discuss the matter. He then said something quite rude and hung up. I realized after a few minutes that not only was it rude, but it was a threat; I didn't like that at all. And, with everything that was going on, in a somewhat reduced mental capacity, I lost control. I got up from my desk and started walking towards this man's office, with the express intent to throttle him. At that moment, I didn't care what would happen to me.

As I got to a point within 100 feet of his office, and was looking at his office door, my other mind kicked in and stopped me before I took one more step. I thought about how easy it would be to hurt this man, and how it wouldn't have been a fair fight. I realized that I would not only lose my job, but probably my career, of which I'd invested 15 years at that juncture. I realized that, unfortunately, I was still going to be the standard for how black people would be judged in this particular community, as my facility had merged with another facility, and I had only been over this particular department at both hospitals for a few months, and this new community had never had to deal with a minority director before. And I realized that, even if I told the story, with the threatening words, that I wouldn't get a free pass because, unfortunately, I would have thrown the first punch.

I stood in that spot for almost 5 minutes; surprising that no one showed up during that time to talk to me, or to even notice I was there. Then I walked back, and decided upon another course of action. I had calmed down, realized how I could use this situation to my advantage, and decided to go another route. I won't go into those details, but I will report that not only did I get a full apology later on in a written letter and in a full forum with other managers, most of whom didn't know what had happened, but I ended the threat to my department being uprooted, the confidentiality of our clients being endangered, and this man being demoted, and eventually dismissed, as it prompted investigations into his department, and, well, let's just say that things were going on that shouldn't have been.

In Economics Of Efficiency by Norris Brisco, he writes that "losing one's temper or retaining self control is a matter of habit". He also writes that "the habit of self control is an important factor in business, and is almost a virtue in a superintendent or boss, because if he loses his temper at every trifle, it reacts upon his men and works toward inefficiency." No one expects that a person may not get upset every once in awhile, but when you're leading others, it's imperative that those times are few, and that the way you react still maintains a modicum of control whenever possible. I've always been proud that I've never yelled at anyone in anger in a business situation, and, other than the one time I mention above, have never come close at any other time to losing physical control of myself. Yet, I have seen many managers who believe it's their right to get in the faces of employees, yell and berate them, and generally embarrass those employees in front of others, oftentimes for almost no real reason. Even if there was a reason to be upset, there's never a true excuse for confronting any employee in that fashion. As I mentioned earlier, the consequences in today's world are indeterminable.

What can you do to try to maintain decorum? There's an article by William DeFoore, Ph.D., titled Anger Management Techniques: Gain Control of your Anger and Improve your Life, which, if you click on the link, will give you 10 tips that you can use to try to gain control over your anger. When you lose control over yourself, no matter what it is, you lose control over your life, possibly in more ways than one.