Thesis statement
Most people believe that anger could be eliminated by giving expression to one’s feelings and emotions, but the truth is that seeking diversions is a better way of anger management.
Introduction
Giving vent to one’s angry feelings only serves to exasperate the tense and high voltage situation. Research studies go to prove that distraction serves as a better antidote for anger control and appeasement. It is seen that distraction serves as an outlet by which the focus points, that causes the anger is altered, which in turn, cuts short the tempo of the angry person, thus affording an opportunity to move away from the subject that causes the anger (Defusing anger/ hostility, 2007).
Distractions also help in alleviating angry moods, especially when this is accompanied with physical violence and unruly conduct. “Believe it or not, a slow walk around the neighborhood can provide you with enough distractions to help you calm down enough to analyze your reactions. This can go a very long way to save you from saying or doing something that you will regret for the rest of your life.“ (Klein, 2009, para.5).
Perhaps one of the major aspects would be that distraction removes the stress element from the angry person’s mind and allows him/her to think more rationally and calmly. It could serve as a mood enhancer that provides positive energies to act against and neutralize the negative emotions that are present during angry bouts. Perhaps, the reason why distraction works in reducing anger levels springs from the fact that when angry and highly stressed, people narrow down their thinking to just that aspect that threatens their well being. “Distraction techniques work by interrupting this process of attentional narrowing so that we stop thinking about what is bothering us for a while and instead think about something else.“ (Mills, Reiss, & Dombeck, 2009, Distraction, para.2).
Contradictions of research statement
However, there are concerns whether this kind of intervention could provide a long term antidote for anger management. According to some people, this could provide a kind of temporary escapism, but may not find lasting solutions for the need for different kinds of anger management to deal with various kinds, and levels of stress situations.
There are inherent dangers in expressing, or even airing one’s angry emotions. The show of anger, or allowing it to move along more constructive ways, tries to remove the negative aspects of anger. However,” The danger in this type of response is that if it isn’t allowed outward expression, your anger can turn inward—on yourself. Anger turned inward may cause hypertension, high blood pressure, or depression.“(Anger, 2009, Expressing anger, para.4). Over time, repressed anger could also lead to a host of chronic illnesses, like heart disease, cerebral strokes and a variety of other life threatening conditions (Anger, 2009). Under certain circumstances, giving vent to angry emotions could exasperate the situation and cause more harm than good. Public display of anger could provide avenues for legal action and lawsuits.
Conclusions
However, one of the best methods to sustain anger management is to seek out and eliminate fundamental cause of such anger. It could be due to non-compliance by others – family members, students or subordinates. The main cause of anger could be the perceived loss of one’s control over domain, and this is intended to help re-establish control functions. Thus, if the primary causes of ostensible threats to leadership or control are eliminated, the causes for anger are removed, and such therapies provide lasting and long term antidotes against anger and its many manifestations. Interventionist strategies like seeking diversions, best serve to reduce the situational impacts of anger and generate positive flow of energies that could influence the extent and level of anger in given situations.
Reference List
Anger: Controlling anger- before it controls you: Expressing anger. (2009). American Psychological Online.
Defusing anger/ hostility. (2007). Web.
Klein, P. (2009). How to overcome anger quickly and easily. Ezine Article.
Mills, H., Reiss, N., & Dombeck, M. (2009). Stress reduction and management: Distraction and humor in stress reduction: Distraction. MentalHelp.Net.