How to Calm Your Anger

“Between a stimulus and a response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” -Viktor Frankl

When we become angry or scared the emotional part of our brain responds within the blink of an eye. This is about ten times faster than the rational, reasoning, problem-solving part of our brain.

While our automatic fight or flight response many have helped our ancestors survive in the wild a long time ago, it often gets us into trouble today. When our anger is triggered we often respond without thinking and this often causes us regret.

Research studies show that if we practice pausing and focusing on our breath when our anger is triggered, we give our logic problem-solving part of our brain time to catch up. And if we practice this long enough, our logical brain will respond as fast as our emotional brain. We can actual rewire our brain to think before we automatically respond off of pure emotion.

The implications of these studies for parents and their children are great. Parents who practice inserting a pause between a triggering event and their reaction will be able to think about how they want to respond to their children before seeing red and reacting off of pure emotion. Parents can also teach children to insert a pause and focus on their breath which will decrease impulsivity.

For me information on calming your brain check out my post

Outbursts of Anger: How to Calm Your Brain

Remember- Your response will almost always be more appropriate when you think before you respond rather than reacting off of pure emotion.