Anger: feel it or fight it?

All emotions are natural and valid, but some overstay their welcome…and in the workplace (and everywhere else) that can cause us challenges.

If you feel anger welling up inside you when the printer isn’t working, it’s probably not the printer you’re really angry about.

To trigger anger vs. mild irritation, there’s something else going on that’s a bigger deal.

I read that our emotions are designed to dissipate after 90 seconds. It takes roughly that long for our body and brain to interpret the message something is wrong, experience the emotion and then fade it out.

So why am I still wound up about the driver that pulled out in front of me when driving yesterday?

Apparently it’s because I’m not processing that emotion. What’s likely is that I was annoyed in the moment, then got annoyed at myself for being annoyed at something trivial, and then got annoyed that it’s still occurring to me a day later.

The answer is to fully feel the emotion the first time around - rather than fighting it. It then naturally fades and your mind doesn’t need to keep triggering it.

So next time you’re infuriated at your office printer, check in- what are you really angry about?

Let yourself feel it rather than fight it and it will fade.