“Control you temper!”

If you haven’t heard this one by now, either you’re a complete angel (highly unlikely) or your simply a human being.

Let’s face it folks. With the end of the school year, graduations left and right, empty nest syndrome, jobs lost, new jobs not what you thought, births and deaths; emotions are going to run excruciatingly high.

Are we right or are we correct?

The human body, mind and soul can only take so much before we get a little perturbed. And you know something? That’s okay.

More often than not when we happen to hear the word anger, we immediately thing of something bad, violent or harmful. Now if you were raised by decent parents which most of us probably were, we were always taught to control our tempers and to “not get angry.”

How many times did you feel your teeth grinding, fist clenching and blood boiling over something which really got your goat and someone went, “You need to calm down.”

Did that help with anything? Did it make you less angry? Did it help you “calm down?” Chances are it did the complete opposite.

It would be wise that we as unperfect beings to finally acknowledge once and for all: It is not a crime to feel or express your anger.

Now of course hold your phone and settle down just a second. Expressing anger does not at all mean physically or even verbally assaulting someone. It does not mean make everyone around you uncomfortable, it doesn’t give us the right to damage property, and it certainly doesn’t give us the right to steal. Finally, we can never threaten anyone with harm, and feeling anger definitely isn’t a good time to be making any decisions.

Remember, certain things we do or say when we are angry have consequences. There is a line already drawn (obviously a little thing called the law), and once crossed there is no going back.

I think now we know where this is actually going.

It’s perfectly okay to feel angry when the time comes. Of course if you are just completely livid about something day after day, it may be time to examine one or two things and maybe make some changes. It shouldn’t be an everyday feeling.

Anger is something to feel, but it is also something to be controlled. The truth is when we let it out in a healthy way, we feel so much better and stronger. Who wouldn’t agree holding on to something in anger is incredibly exhausting? It’s like an enormous weight bearing down on our soul. The problem is, what do we do with it? We were always told to “not get angry” and “control our temper.”

Yes, control your temper, but go ahead and feel angry for a bit. It’s probably not going to go anywhere unless you do something about it.

Again, when we say do something about it, it does not mean get violent and crazy.

One amazing thing people often times misunderstand is when we choose to simply leave a situation where extreme anger is in the midst, 999 times out of 1,000 it was absolutely the right thing to do.

It’s called taking some time.

Kind of like when your parents sent you to you room when you were little and were told not to come back until you were ready?

The exact same thing here.

There is no point in staying in a room or situation where tensions and emotions are running sky high. It’s okay to just walk away and mentally process a few things. When people see someone walking away in anger the natural response seems to be, “Why would you leave now? We’re arguing here!”

Well the reality is nothing ever gets resolved by arguing, insulting, or biting people’s heads off. When it gets to that point, keep the anger for a bit and just walk away. No punches, no throwing things, no slamming doors, no threats.

Just step away.

Time to go process and digest things for a minute. Your body and mind will thank you in the long run. Just like when you were a kid calming down in your room, go ahead and return when you are ready. By that time usually everyone else has already done the same thing, is ready to learn from it and move on. It’s how we grow and our relationships get stronger.

And when that time comes, go ahead and move on. Feeling guilty or making others feel guilty, once again, will not do anything to help anyone. In so many ways, guilt is far worse and with even more consequences than expressing a little anger here and there. 

This is why it’s okay to get a little angry and express it sometimes. Decent everyday people, regardless of societal standing or social class, do not need any long-term guilt.

So please, no guilt trips toward anyone. It will just build on heavier over time, and is enough to break anyone no matter how tough they think they are. 

Forgive and forget people. Nobody ever said we were perfect. Only He can judge, and none of us are in any position to judge anyone.

Remember guys, anger is a secondary emotion. What does that mean you are probably asking? It means it is brought on by other strong emotional feelings such as love, loss, frustration, sadness, fear, despair or anxiety. Essentially when these things become so intense, anger is going to arise once in a while.

Now take it for what it’s worth there folks. Like we have admitted time and time again, we are all just human. Nobody is perfect. So the next time you get pissed, go ahead and feel it. Then go do something healthy about it.

In all honesty, it would be wise to leave anything involving firearms out of this until you’re good to go again. But hey, at the end of the day we can’t and aren’t trying to control anyone. Make your own decisions. Just remember the consequences are yours if you lose your temper with a gun in your hand. Ultimately we are all responsible for our own decisions.

There you have it for this one, and don’t resent someone too much for too long if they got mad at you. When someone truly doesn’t care about something, they wouldn’t feel anything at all. 

We wouldn’t get so angry sometimes if we didn’t care so much.

If anything, it shows how much we do care.