When You Get Angry, It’s Time for a Reframe

Brief 

Adam Grant tries to process critical or even insulting feedback by understanding what makes him angry, such as his fears of being incompetent or irrelevant. Anger is a warning sign of feeling at risk, but if the critic doesn’t have a stake in your life, “why am I giving them power over how I feel?” Grant writes.

Insight

I got a few nasty messages this week. One person called me an asshat and a mediocre white man. I’m still wondering whether the two insults were redundant.

The day before, I had asked my audience what topics they wanted me to address in the future. One of the more popular themes was how to deal with anger, and it turned out to be timely (thank you, Ricardo Martinez).

I don’t get mad often. In fact, people who know me well have told me I don’t get angry often enough. Apparently I have a habit of taking things in stride that should make my blood boil. Which either means I know little about pure rage or a fair amount about how to avoid letting it consume me.

When psychologists study emotion regulation, they often highlight two effective strategies: distraction and reframing. Anger is a full frontal assault on your amygdalda. You try to warn someone, “You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry,” but a split-second later you’re stomping around: “Hulk smash!”

Anger makes distraction difficult. It narrows your focus to the person who’s wronged you, to the point that it’s hard to shift your attention to anything else.Reframing isn’t a cakewalk, but it’s what I find most helpful when I start fuming. My first instinct is to ask, “How do I engage my prefrontal cortex?”