4 steps to expressing anger

Yesterday’s Daily Tip explored 3 radical claims about expressing anger. Today, we will explore a more powerful way to express anger.

Unlike other forms of communication, Dr. Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication does not encourage us to ignore, squash, or swallow anger, but to express the core of our anger fully and wholeheartedly.

He gives us the following four-step process to fully express our anger.

1)  Stop. Breathe.
2)  Identify our own judgmental thoughts.
3)  Connect with your needs.
4)  Express your feelings and unmet needs.

Rosenberg tells the story of getting in a cab and hearing the dispatcher say on the radio to pickup up Mr. Fishman at the synagogue on Main Street. Then the driver says to him, “These kikes get up early so they can screw everybody out of their money.”

Rosenberg said there was smoke coming out of his ears for 20 seconds, and it took everything he had not to resort to the violent ways of his youth and strangle the guy.

It would have been easy, and enjoyable, to tell the guy off, or embarrass him, or call him out, but as enjoyable as these methods of expression are, they ultimately don’t help us get our needs met or help people see the pain they cause.

Instead, Rosenberg paused and “attended to his feelings,” staying conscious that his anger wasn’t coming from the man or the words he said, but from a place of fear deep inside himself. The man was the trigger, not the source.

Rosenberg let the emotions flow through him and play themselves out, even enjoying the image of smashing the cab driver’s head. He stayed conscious of his own violent thoughts without judging them, until he was able to see the humanness in the man’s comments.

The first thing Rosenberg said, wasn’t a judgment, accusation, or correction, but an attempt to connect on the level of needs.

“Are you feeling frustrated? It sounds like you have had some bad experiences with Jewish people.”

“Yeah! These people are disgusting. They’ll do anything for money!”

“You feel distrust and the need to protect yourself when you’re dealing with them?”

“That’s right!”

Rosenberg continued listening to the man rant, honing in, not on the words, but what was behind them -- the human feelings and unmet needs behind each feeling.

Describing the encounter, Rosenberg explained that “When I hear that he’s scared and wants to protect himself, I recognize how I also have a need to protect myself and know what it’s like to be scared.”

He listened to the man rant for 10 minutes, not just about Jews, but “Blacks” as well. This whole time, Rosenberg kept listening for needs.

Rosenberg didn’t let him know what was going on inside himself until the man felt understood, otherwise the man would not have been able to hear him.

Then he spoke.

“You know, when you first started to talk, I felt a lot of frustration, sadness, and discouragement, because I’ve had very different experiences with Jews than you’ve had, and I was wanting you to have much more of the kind of experiences I’ve had. Can you tell me what you heard me say?”

“Oh, I’m not saying they’re ALL….”

“Excuse me. Hold on. Can you tell me what you heard me say?”

“You’re saying I have no right to talk the way I did.”

“No, I would like you to hear me differently. I really don’t want to blame you.”

Rosenberg had to slow down the conversation because people can not hear when they believe they are at fault.

Rosenberg continued the conversation, attempting to get the man, not to feel shame, guilt, or blame but simply to fully appreciate his own pain, explaining: “I didn’t want him to hear blame. Blaming is easy. People are used to hearing blame; sometimes they agree with it and hate themselves -- which doesn’t stop them from behaving the same way -- and something they hate us for calling them racists or whatever -- which also doesn’t stop their behavior. If we sense blame entering the mind we may need to slow down...go back, and hear their pain for a while more.”

While it would take a lot of practice to be able to communicate this way in a situation like this (and I admit I am not there myself), it is possible today to follow the four steps above, to express our anger more fully.

By expressing our needs behind our emotions, we are far more likely to get them met than by judging, blaming, or punishing others.