How Can I Manage My Anger?

Take our Anger Management Test

Find a therapist to heal from anger

Anger can be a scary emotion to allow ourselves to feel.

Simply working on "managing" anger does not help us move through the feelings.

Being able to talk openly about interpersonal anger can actually deepen our relationships.

Any quick scroll online, or a walk through an airport, might suggest that we are already angry enough, maybe we don’t need to talk more about our rage. A recent Gallup survey tracked years of increasing anger and stress, placing us in what it called a decade of “global unhappiness.” We often see rants in a comments section on some social media platform, or witness intense road rage while driving, and even experience living with intensified political violence. And it seems as if the only thing Republicans and Democrats can agree on these days is that they are all mad. Unfortunately, our current attempts to share feelings of anger are indirect and ineffective. There is a better way.

Though we experience anger powerfully, we do not process it well – we are not great at talking it through. Anger management has long been the go-to when discussing how to “treat” this potentially consuming emotion. Embedded in this treatment approach is the idea that we should minimize our anger. While anger management treatments vary widely, what is not discussed nearly enough is the idea that sharing our anger in our relationships is actually a pathway to deeper connection and ultimately can leave us feeling safer, which eventually has ripple effects.

The concept of "relational friction,” which is the experience of tolerating interpersonal conflict and moving forward in that relationship, continues to receive attention as it is a crucial piece of most of our day-to-day relationships. Today, we lack skills for telling people directly that we are mad at them – despite all the anger, there is little direct confrontation.

I am a licensed psychologist specializing in relational psychotherapy. I understand the rage. I am mad, and I sit with clients who talk about their anger daily. But even more than that, I am terrified of our collective inability to discuss anger and how this will continue to affect our sociopolitical landscape. The only path forward is to take a page from the relational psychotherapy handbook and practice the art of sharing our anger, because these days everyone is p*ssed.

In my office, I encourage my clients to tell me when they are mad at me. Maybe I didn’t respond to a message fast enough, or I misinterpreted an experience they disclosed. Even when I took my two maternity leaves, my clients knew they were always welcome to share how I had upset, disappointed, or angered them. They have come to expect this freedom in the room, and sharing their anger towards me is a celebrated part of the work we do.

When I describe this aspect of therapy to friends or family, they struggle to comprehend. There is confusion around how this could be helpful, and they most certainly do not understand why clients would be mad at me. But what I am doing is helping clients to build their capacity for relational friction, an inevitable aspect of any long-term relationship and a helpful means of practicing having feelings and working towards neutralizing their intensity.

Relational friction is the byproduct of authentic relationships between humans. It comes in many forms, including disagreements, disappointments, and other ruptures. The experience of friction in a relationship requires people to express their needs and desires. It also requires a certain amount of tolerating discomfort, a challenge for many.

How Can I Manage My Anger?

Take our Anger Management Test

Find a therapist to heal from anger

In my practice, I conduct both individual and group therapy, where I get to see this play out. Starting in late 2024, millions of Americans had to decide what to do with their anger towards neighbors, parents, and other loved ones who voted differently from them. Adults who met weekly and shared their experiences, thoughts, and deepest feelings towards one another got the chance to express their rage and disappointment at others who voted differently with people they were already in a group therapy relationship with. The experience was heated, and yet, group members directly shared more about their history and background, expressing why they voted for who they voted for. The anger did not go away, the disappointment stands, yet these adults had space and freedom to describe their experiences. And it has made their relationships with one another deeper.

My hope is that the more we can practice sharing our anger in small and safe ways, the more we build the capacity to work productively with others whom we might feel anger towards. The reality is that our world, being as fractured as it is, means we need more skills at tolerating our own feelings and sharing them in a way that will move the needle. Simply assuming that anger should be “managed” leaves us stuck. And the time for more angry rhetoric is done; we need productive conversations around our rage in order to heal.

While it is certainly true that we do not disagree well in this country, we can’t simply make ivory tower observations about this dysfunction. More Americans are seeking talk therapy than ever before. Currently about a quarter of Americans are in therapy. While far from adequate, therapy has become more accessible. In the face of an increasingly polarized country and technology that continues to threaten our ability to tolerate difficulties in relationships, therapy offices are a deeply satisfying place to practice airing our aggression.

And in the new frontier of AI, deeper human connection is going to become not only harder, but that much more important. Already, the advent of AI in our lives has brought even fewer opportunities to engage in relational friction. From the millions of people turning to AI to help resolve relational disputes to people opting for relationships with AI; we will continue to miss out on these opportunities for rupture and repair. The sycophantic nature of the AI beast does not prime us well to be direct with our feelings towards others in our lives. But we desperately need the practice of being honest, messy, and even mad. Going deeper in our relationships by being honest makes us feel like we are part of something, which might also prime us for more empathic interpersonal interactions. The more we practice sharing our feelings towards people who are close to us, the better equipped we become at having any chance at productive conversations on a larger scale.

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