The causes of feelings
From Notes
This page captures a discussion around the topic of anger.
Contents |
Anger, and 'thinking'
There were some differences expressed around the experience of 'anger', and whether it wholly described as a feeling that is caused by (life-alienated) 'thinking'.
I'd like to offer the following and see if it adds any clarity, or is any help.
Anger can arise very quickly, reflexively even. For example maybe when ...
A person who we are already suspicious of runs at us in a way we interpret as aggressive...
Depending on the situation we may instantaneously experience anger. No 'thinking' seems to be involved, it all happens very quickly. So it really seems that the behaviour of the person is the cause of our anger.
Yet if we find that our interpretation of that situation was mistaken, for example ...
it turns out the person was saving us from a falling object we were unaware of ...
anger quickly goes away. If we had interpreted the situation in other ways we could have felt almost any emotion - depending on our interpretation. This shows that even if our interpretation is accurate, the cause of our feeling is still our interpretation.
Sometimes those interpretations are the result of long deliberations; sometimes as in the example above they happen at the speed of reflex - heavily conditioned by our previous experience and dispositions.
Hence what people say or do can be a stimulus for our feelings, but never the 'cause'. The cause is our interpretations, 'how we take it'.
Anger, guilt, shame and depression are especially interesting because they signal life-alienated thinking (based in moralistic judgements of ourselves or others).
Notice that none of the above makes any judgement about whether the emotions, behaviours and situations are 'good', 'bad', 'right', 'wrong', 'useful', 'not-useful'. It is only saying that our feelings are not caused directly by the other person as they may seem. Instead they are caused by our interpretation, our 'thinking'.
Is that any help?
Adrian
Anger and drama
I agree broadly with what you've said above "it is not things in themselves that trouble us, but the opinions we hold about things" (quoted from some ancient Chinese sage in a Dorothy Rowe book I've now lost). However, I don't really see that anger is different from other feelings (anger, fear, happiness) in this respect. If I see a cat run over and think it's mine I may be intensely sad - even if it turns out I was wrong about the cat the feeling was real.
As I said at the Sheffield meeting, one of the most useful distinctions for me about anger has been anger versus drama (David Richo, "How to be an Adult" 1991 Paulist Press - highly recommended text with a Jungian outlook). Some quotes from Richo to give the gist:
"Anger is a natural human feeling that everyone experiences often and that needs to be expressed to maintain psychological health. Anger is the feeling that says No to opposition, injury, or injustice. It is a signal that something I value is in jeopardy."
"The psychological energy of anger comes from the real or imagined sense of threat. Anger is thus legitimately expressed even when its foundation is irrational."
"Why do we feel so unsafe about expressing anger openly? We may have found early in life that anger was dangerous. There are two main ways to have learned this:" "1) showing anger in our childhood may have meant no longer being loved or approved and now we are acting as if that were still true." "2) Receiving anger may seem dangerous because previously in life anger has led to violence, either physically or emotionally. But this was not real anger, only a dramatic mime of it."
"We distinguish anger (a true feeling) from drama (an avoidance of true feeling)" "Drama means ego-centered, manipulative theatrics with an explanatory storyline attached." "Drama scares the hearer, is meant to silence the other, blames the other for what one feels, insists the other sees how justified one is." "Anger informs and creates attention in the hearer, is meant to communicate with the other, takes responsibility for this feeling as one's own, is brief and then let go of with a sense of closure, and needs no response." "Notice that anger, like all feelings, coexists with other feelings. It never masks them." "'Holding onto anger' is also impossible since anger is the shortest feeling. It cannot be held onto... What is held onto is not anger but a set of storylines that keep the drama ignited."
This explanation has really helped me to learn to trust myself to be angry, and to reduce my use of drama. Richo talks about 'parsing' an anger experience - I think that NVC is a great way to do that - understanding what is in jeopardy by looking at what needs are not being met.
Richo's 'set of storylines that keep the drama ignited' chimed for me with what you said about 'thinking' - but I think it is drama, not anger, that is linked to 'moralistic judgements'.
Hope this is of use and interest. It will be interesting for me to think about whether Richo's view that it is healthy to express anger is in conflict with NVC thinking.
Cheers Jenny
Anger: Special, unhelpful and helpful
Hi Jenny,
You are helping me think this through and learn about it; I'm grateful for that - it's a really helpful practice for me.
Some of this is undoubtedly about how the words being used, and I know many find such discussions to be point-missing. In the end the words are irrelevant, though I for one havn't got to the point yet where I'm clear enough that I can dispense with this kind of understanding. I know when I look at Marshalls work it seems to have been developed through extensive study of this kind in order to reach the effective clarity he has managed, which gives him his power in practice. So I'm prepared to work at this.
It seems we roughly agree that anger is caused by being caused by thinking - which is what I'd taken as being the key crux of disagreement for those present that evening.
So what we have to explore, if it's helpful to do so, is:
- As all feelings can be caused by thinking, is anger really any different?
- Are anger and drama distinctions missing in Marshall's scheme?
Is anger special?
Bearing in mind the approximate nature of the words, I believe Marshall's insight here is that all feelings can be caused by thinking, but anger (along with guilt, shame and depression) are *only* caused by 'life alienated thinking'. So when we experience those emotions they are cues that we are engaged in a mode disconnected from our needs.
The terms 'anger' and 'needs' there are used in the way Marshall talks about them, which may be different from how they are used elsewhere. So for me the question is 'can I get any benefit from trying to see it that way'. And I believe I do; it seems to have power in practice.
Are anger and drama distinctions missing in Marshall's scheme?
It sounds like there are some important distinctions around the area of anger. Some aspects of anger we'd commonly identify as destructive, unhelpful and ultimately harmful - even if they give short term pleasure or release from anxiety. Maybe 'drama' is of this kind? The question in those cases is what is the best way of responding when we experience such emotions.
Other aspects are less clear: 'Indignation' is sometimes delineated as a kind of anger that motivates and energises us when we are faced with cruelty and oppression, and which leads us to take action. These seem to have a need-based, life-serving aspect.
Perhaps the term 'anger' is too coarse, and it's refinement is of real value. In that sense, "anger/drama" works for me, though I'm uncomfortable with 'anger' as the word for the positive form because it's so often used do denote unbridled violence. For me I'd stick with anger as the coarse form, and look for something that touches the sense of 'indignation' suggested above.
Even so, I'm happy with Marshall's distinction. Because the key differentiation involved - whether the emotion is rooted in need-connected or life-alienated thinking - seems experientially valid to me. I've experienced anger in the life alienated, judgemental sense often enough, both in gross and subtle forms. Looking behind the judgements to find life-connected needs has transformed the feeling into something more authentic, powerful and non-violent, and that is a real experience for me.
And I've experienced frustration and indignation as authentic and need-connected too - as in connection with needs for equality, fairness and safety.
In the end Marshall is quite explicit that words are only approximate and cant capture it. He cites Korzibsky's 'the map is not the territory' as words not being rich enough to hold the qualities and texture of real experience. So they are only useful in discussions such as this as long as we can genuinely learn from them.
Does that help reconcile this with the anger/drama distinction?
(here's a link to youtube with Marshall talking about anger)
Best wishes
Adrian
Anger transformed
There's a buddhist understanding of anger that I came across which I found interesting, so wanted to add that here. I've changed the terminology to plain english, as far as I can, but if I've made any assumptions, please let me know and I'll translate further.
According to the buddha, human beings are said to be made up of five "heaps" or constituent parts. These are:
- form
- feeling
- perception
- volition or will
- consciousness
(I realise this needs further explanation, but for the purpose of this brief piece, please take those at face value.)
Under the influence of what is a mistaken notion of having a fixed independent self, (conventionally called the "ego"), these constituent parts of ourselves give rise to certain characteristics, and when freed from this notion ("right view"), give rise to five "wisdoms".
According to this map, the heap of consciousness under the guidance of the ego creates the disturbing emotion of anger, and when this heap is transformed by right view, it takes on the characteristic of being able to see things exactly as they are, with no bias, clearly reflecting what is there (this is called the "mirror-like wisdom").
It is explained thus: "Anger can be said to be a frozen form of the mirror-like wisdom. It you think of the analogy of water, water in its natural state is limpid and clear and reflects everything without partiality but when it becomes frozen, it becomes hard and solid and does not reflect anything. Similarly, consciousness, in its natural state, is all-reflective, it simply reflects all phenomena as they are. When it become frozen and hard through the presence of ignorance (ie. having the mistaken notion of a fixed independant self), then it takes on this hard, sharp, unreflective aspect which we call anger. Anger has some kind of intelligence in it. It sees something about the situation but reacts in a very negative and self-centred way, (if the sense of identity feels threat in some way) whereas if that anger is relaxed, it becomes this all-reflective wisdom which is totally impartial."
One quality of the impartiality of this wisdom is its imperturbability - something which reminds me of that quality of being fully present, or of immovable presence which someone like Marshall demonstrates so well.
Sophie
