Main emotions: fear, grief, anger and their functions

Inspired by my phenomenal clients who do “the inner work no matter what” and the magical Martha Beck

Hi, are you angry all the time? I was.

For a very long-time anger was my default reaction. For a very long time, all I felt was anger. I shouted at my kids instantly, I angrily obsessed over, ranted about and criticized behaviour of my colleagues, neighbours, family, friends, world leaders, drug overlords, celebrities, you name it.

In some way, I felt like a crusader, fighting for justice, being on the never-ending mission to correct the wrongs of others, and the world.

It didn’t make me happy, it made me madder and madder.

When I could not stand the madness of anger any more, I started thinking why is anger taking over my life?

There must be a reason the anger is here.

Now, the function of anger as an emotion is to correct injustice according to Martha Beck.

Anger often shows up in trauma work with my clients. After emotions of shame and guilt have been released, anger surfaces up. No wonder this happens because anger is an emotion of moving forward, protecting yourself and seeking justice for yourself.

For example, one of my client, let’s call her Aline, suffered from attachment trauma. She was not loved, soothed, seen, felt protected as a baby in her family, she could not express herself when she was hurt or needed something. As a result, she formed beliefs that she was bad, internally there was something so wrong with her that she was not allowed to exist. As an adult, she often felt guilt and shame and continued to adapt to people in her environment, seeking approval from them and making herself small, convenient and invisible, no matter what.

After releasing the attachment trauma toxins and letting go off the energies of emotions of shame and guilt, she started feeling angry at people and situations to which she had normally adapted.

Why does this happen? In this example, anger is the right emotion to feel, even though it freaks her out because it is so foreign and unfamiliar for her.

It’s time to be angry but you have to make anger work for you. How?

Check when anger rises. Ask yourself: “What injustice am I correcting?” “What is the injustice?” At some point in your healing journey, if you are like Aline, you will stop tolerating those who have been feeding off your shame and guilt and feeling not enough. Remember, these people do not miraculously disappear when you do your inner work, they do not change or accept NEW you, they are most likely to be against any developments in you and they will fight you.

If this happens, remind yourself : anger is healthy, it moves me forward, try to do it without judging yourself.

Identify what you can not tolerate at this time.

Identify what you need but you are not getting in your environment. If your environment is generally critical and not supportive and you can’t tolerate it any more, start looking for people, situations that build you up, cheer you on, and support you. Create that change.

M.Beck writes: “To go on on your healing journey, you must give up the illusion that you are helpless. If you persist, you will gain gentleness and power.”

Here is the emotion of anger and its function.