No One Makes You Angry!

by COSS Blog Contributor Joann Homen

Anger, that annoying emotion that sneaks up on us every once and awhile. Anger makes us do things we normally would not do like lash out with belittling words and / or actions towards others and sometimes even ourselves.

Here is a little secret.... YOU and ONLY YOU is responsible for your angry response!

You can't blame others for your anger because you could have chosen to let it go and to not let whatever happened bother you. By allowing the experience to bother you and facilitate a state of anger, YOU and ONLY YOU have chosen to react from a position of anger.

This does not excuse the fact that sometimes other people do dumb stuff that is annoying to us, but it is our attachment to the experience and our ego’s judgement that determines how we will react.

Anger does not always come from others either. I can't tell you how many times I get frustrated with my TV controller when it doesn't work how I want it to. I ALLOW myself to get angry and frustrated. The controller is an inanimate object and it hasn't done anything to me, except maybe not work when I want it to and how I want it to, but the controller did nothing to evoke any emotion from me, I CHOSE to react how I reacted!

When an experience happens in our life, we might find that we respond in a knee jerk reaction to it, but lets keep it real, we are ultimately in control of how we react or do not react to the experience.

Next time you find yourself getting worked up over something, remember:

ANY and ALL reactions are on YOU.....PERIOD!