Understanding Anger

Channelize your anger

Thand Rakh: Bade Bade Life Mein, Choti Choti Baatein Hoti Rehati Hain!

Anger cannot be managed or avoided; it’s futility must be understood.

I recently met a former colleague of mine after 15 years. She used to work on my team. We got chatting. Over the conversation, she enquired if I still flew into rage like I used to back then. She recounted an instance when I had flung a picture frame from my desk at her because she walked up to report a mishap that had happened to a client deliverable. She said she was saved because she ducked in the nick of time! I was undoubtedly embarrassed being reminded of my forgettable, and shameful, past. I appear to have had a serious issue dealing with my anger.

My practice of mouna – daily silence periods – helped me immensely in understanding my anger and in channelizing that energy productively. This is what I have learnt.

You get angry with someone or with a situation because you feel you are unable to control them. Anger stems from an inherent want to control everything about your Life. Awareness of the true nature of Life is really the only way you can understand the futility of anger. Your education, your ability to earn a living, your logical thinking may tell you that Life can be controlled. But only when you go through inscrutable Life experiences and realize that Life has a mind of its own, that there are things and situations in Life that are beyond your control, will you come to accept your fallibility. Only then will you see the futility of anger. Once you understand that anger is a waste of energy, you will start conserving that energy. The more aware you are, the less you get angry with stuff you can’t control. That’s how you can channelize that energy into changing what you don’t like about your Life. This is what Gandhi did – he channelized his anger against the British governing us to lead a revolution that eventually got us independence. And at the highest level of evolution, you are able to invest all your energy, that may have been frittered away as mindless anger, in loving others, in healing the world – think Mother Teresa or the Dalai Lama, and you will picture what I mean!

I have also learnt that anger cannot be managed or avoided. Anger will arise when you don’t get what you want or you get what you don’t want. You will be angered when someone disturbs your equilibrium; when someone does not fulfil a promise or lets you down. But if you are aware, you will let your anger arise and subside. You may be seized by the heat of the moment, you may start to lose your cool or grit your teeth, but you will seamlessly switch to seeing how pointless it is to hurl unchannelized energy at someone or something. This is how I have learnt to deal with my anger. I don’t try to manage or avoid it. I let it rise, whenever it does, and I let it go. And I guess I am able to do that because I understand anger – and Life – better today than I did 15 years ago.

The trigger for this post though was not my colleague recalling the angry young AVIS. It was what happened at a pharmacy this morning that led to this post. I had to buy a few medicines. And the storekeeper took awfully long. He kept attending to everyone else but me. When it finally came to payment time, my card transaction was declined even as I received an SMS from my bank saying my account had been debited. I then had to cough up precious cash to complete the purchase. When I got back home and narrated the experience to Vaani, I said something that made me realize how much I had evolved. I told her, “It’s okay. I am glad I kept my cool! Because, bade bade Life mein, aisi choti choti baatien hoti rehati hain…!” Meaning: “In a long eventful Life, such small events keep happening!”

Angry kya? The source of all your anger is within you!

Mindless anger is avoidable.

The CEO of a mid-size firm confessed to me that he has anger management issues. He said he gets ‘ticked off on the flimsiest pretext’ and wanted to know how he could ‘control his anger’.

This CEO reminded me of myself. I used to be this way. In fact, even now, at times, I do get angry. But, until a few years ago, my anger was mindless and would last several days. But now, my awareness, cultivated to through the practice of mouna (observing silence periods daily) helps me see the anger rising in me and encourages me to allow it to subside – because I now know that I can’t solve any problem or change any situation that I dislike by merely being mindlessly angry with it!

Let me explain how I have understood to deal with anger.

I used to have a personal assistant who would always, always, mess things up. And his behavior, his body language, his utterances, in fact, his very presence would infuriate me. One day, after another high-decibel screaming episode with him, I remarked to Vaani, in complete frustration, “You know what? I am to blame for retaining this guy with us. He’s not the source of my anger and misery. I am!”

That statement was a Eureka moment for me! Perhaps I was aided by my reflective practice of mouna, maybe I was driven to enlightenment by my frustration with myself, whatever it was, it certainly helped me see the futility of my mindless rage. Clearly. Over the following weeks, I meditated more on this understanding. I realized that whenever you get angry with someone, you have caused that anger within you first. The target of your anger is outside of you – but the anger has risen within you. There is no point working on the target. You must work on the source.

I employed this learning sincerely over the months that followed. In fact, after some years of diligent practice, I still believe this awareness is something you must sustain continuously. You must work on being aware in each moment.

So, every time I get angry with someone or something, I remind myself that just getting angry mindlessly is a waste. Trying to control anger doesn’t work either. Because when you control anger, you are repressing it – which is why you are often not even “seeing” that you are angry, whenever you are angry! You are resisting a natural human response. And whatever you resist, persists. Instead, go to the root cause of your anger. And always, every single time, you will find that your anger is born out of what you expect, out of what you desire. And when you see your desire clearly, ask yourself if you are capable of changing a current reality into an aspirational reality? If you think you can do this, then channelize the energy from your anger to achieve that aspirational state. Employ your anger for a Higher Purpose. (That’s what Gandhi did with the Indian Freedom Movement.) If you can’t, simply let go of your anger.

Anger is like any other emotion – it will rise like a wave in you, as a natural human response to a situation. If you are aware of it you can either use the energy for a constructive outcome or you can let it go. If you are not aware of it, in extreme cases, it can even consume you. But more often than not it makes you feel helpless and miserable! Why would you want to cause your own suffering?

A good starting point to deal with anger is to work on yourself – so begin with letting go of all expectations. Do your best, each time, and don’t set any conditions on the outcome of your efforts. Let whatever will happen, happen. In fact, whether you like it or not, whatever is due to happen will only happen. So, have an open mind, this awareness, all the time. That way, when anger arises within you, as it naturally will when what you don’t like, want or expect happens to you, you will see how pointless it is to get mindlessly angry. See if your anger can be employed to achieve a Higher Purpose. If you see that it can’t be, simply let it go. This is the only way to avoid being mindlessly angry!

PS: If you liked this blogpost, please share it to help spread the learning it carries!

 

Neighbor’s envy can never be a problem for you

Jealousy is as wasteful as worrying is. It can’t touch you and it can’t get you anywhere either!

A friend is launching a new business. He consulted me and Vaani on the idea and his launch strategy. At the end of the conversation, he thanked us profusely for our time and requested us to keep it under wraps. Of course, any new idea must be protected and preserved until it is launched. But his reasoning was different: “I am very wary of professional and personal jealousy. I don’t want anyone to cast an evil eye on my idea.”

Somehow, I can’t wrap my head around this ‘evil eye’ concept. Just thinking that it exists and that it can affect you is so regressive. No, I am not being dismissive about jealousy. I am only suggesting that we develop a mature response to it.

Let us understand jealousy first. Someone is said to be jealous of you when they wish or want what you have or they want to be who you are. So, essentially, it is in the eye of the beholder. Now, this is something very normal, very human.

You see someone having a nice phone or a beautiful car and you wish or want that phone or car. You think of it and say to yourself that it will be great if you owned them too. This happens to all of us, all the time. So just accept jealousy as a normal response to Life as it happens around you. In some cases, jealousy is accompanied by anger, resentment and insecurity. So, some people feel jealous more intensely than others. Some talk openly about it. Others cook within themselves feeling wretched that they don’t have what someone else has. Again it is only in the eye of the beholder. It is only what, and how, the person who is jealous is feeling. Now, if this person examines this feeling of jealousy closely, they will see the futility of it. Surely, wishing and wanting never got anyone anything – or anywhere! So, when they see the futility of being jealous, they will stop being jealous. Simple. And as long as they don’t understand its futility, they will keep cooking in it. Just as they will cook in fear or anxiety or worry. So, ultimately, the choice to cook or to let go, to be free, is the individual’s.

Now, if you are the subject of someone’s envy, you can see and you know for sure that you are only the subject. It is all happening to the other person, in the other person. Until such time that you don’t invite yourself to the party, you are free. But the moment you start imagining that the other person’s feelings will impact you, you are entrapped. That’s when you too will start cooking within – ‘Are things going wrong because so-and-so has cast an evil eye?’, ‘Will I lose what I have because someone’s envious of me?’, ‘How can I protect myself from jealousy?’…. – and lose your inner peace. Pause and reflect. How is such thinking productive? Is it serving any purpose? When you hold someone’s jealous attitude towards you and examine it, you too will realize its futility. Until you started giving it any attention, you were free. But now you are fearful, insecure, worried and anxious. Do you need to be this way? Isn’t all this avoidable?

Clearly, you can’t possibly do anything about what other people are thinking. But can’t you at least change your thinking and be free from wasteful emotions?

I don’t deny jealousy exists or wish that it doesn’t arise. It is a natural human response to, and in, Life. Like any other emotion it will rise. But if you understand that it can’t touch you or that it can’t get you anywhere, you will recognize its futility. So, when you don’t give jealousy any attention, it will slink away. Quietly. I let jealousy simply be. Whether it is arising in me or for me. I don’t give it any attention. So it doesn’t touch me or affect me. And I can tell you that Life is really beautiful, awesome in fact, without that wasteful emotion!

Silence always speaks when words can’t or when words fail!

Being silent is an art that is worth exploring, learning and practicing.

In response to my blogpost yesterday on living in a WhatsApp Group-ridden world, a reader pinged me to ask: Is silence a virtue or is it a sign of weakness?

Good question, I thought.

The normal human tendency is to rush to speak, be heard, clarify, demand attention or defend – as the situation or context may warrant. So, when people choose to remain silent, either not making use of an opportunity to speak up or not responding to a provocation, the popular inference is that the person choosing silence is weak or has something to hide. Well, to be sure, it may mean neither. Perhaps the person has nothing to say or believes that being silent is an answer or sufficient response in itself or recognizes the futility in speaking at that point in time.

I have learned the value of remaining silent, over retorting, defending, clarifying or expressing, through experience. There was a time when I would rush to offer my point of view – either in defense or to justify – in all contexts. I used to imagine then that if something had to be said, it had better be expressed then and there, loud and clear. Over time though, I have learned to believe otherwise.

In fact, I now revere, and am inspired by my own father’s ability to choose silence as a response each time that he could have spoken. I remember, with a huge sense of shame, once, many years ago, when there was a raging issue in my family, how I demanded to know from my Dad whether he was spineless. I asked that question brusquely – my tone was uncouth, violent and unbecoming of a son. We sat in a hotel lobby (because we could not speak in private at his home) when I asked him the hugely provocative and embarrassing question: “Why are you not speaking up for what is right, Dad? Are you spineless?” My Dad, much to my shock, and infuriating me no end, responded with a blank look on his face. He simply, yet again, said nothing, choosing to be silent. I came back from that meeting with my father disillusioned and angry. But today, perhaps wiser from learning from Life, I completely agree with my Dad’s choice with reference to the context we were all dealing with then – and now! I don’t think there could have been or can be a better response to situations that we are faced with as a family. And it is not just with my family or with a specific situation. In several situations in Life, remaining silent is perhaps the best response.

I am still learning this art though. And it isn’t always easy. Here’s what I have learned:

•  Whatever be the course our lives take, based on decisions and choices we make, people will have opinions. They may cast aspersions on you. They may demand explanations. Or simply provoke you wantonly.
• Wherever you see no value being added with your expressing yourself, and of course when you think your speaking (up) will only confound the situation, it is best to remain silent.
• No matter what people say, remember, at the end of the day you have your Life to live. And if you can avoid potential, wasteful conflicts by choosing to be silent, why not go about your Life and business silently?

Of course, sometimes speaking up becomes a necessity, not an option. And in all such cases, a conflict normally becomes unavoidable. But such conflict is constructive and never destructive. How then do you decide when to speak up and when to be silent? A good rule of thumb is to make the choice of remaining silent not so much to avoid conflict__but so that you don’t end up creating one!

Silence is a great force. Because silence always speaks when words can’t or when words fail! It will ultimately lead you to a great, unimpeachable inner peace.

Go to work on your problems than just lament about them

When Life’s problems seem insurmountable, take each day as it comes, but keep at your problems without thinking of the outcomes.

There will be times when nothing will seem to go your way. Situations at work will be unproductive – stressful, political and complex. Your relationship could be heading nowhere – often leaving you lonely and lost. The money may just not be enough. And any efforts you make to fix things, to find solutions, to make the situation better, may only end up confounding matters. The normal response to such a situation is anger, frustration and depression. When these emotions arise, observe them. Hold them and give them your attention. Ask yourself if feeling angry, frustrated or depressed is of any use in a situation when you don’t like what you are getting in Life. When you realize the futility of anger, frustration and depression, you will immediately want to let them go.

Running away from Life or feeling sad continuously for what has happened or feeling guilty for what you may have contributed to what has happened – none of these serve any purpose. In fact, Life never cares how you feel. Life just goes on happening. And if you bring debilitating thoughts to the table, if you keep clinging on to the negativity that arises as a result within you, you will feel bogged down and held hostage.

What is a problem situation at the end of the day? Any situation that you dislike is a problem situation. Plain and simple. If what you dislike must go away – one of two things must happen. Either you must work on driving it away. Or you must walk away from it. You can’t forever be lamenting that you dislike a situation. That’s escapism. Of course, in any situation, you can act, you can take remedial steps. So, act. Don’t worry about the results. Simply act. An action may lead you to a result. And you may like or dislike that result. Then act again if you must change that result. That’s how it works. Inaction on account of depression, anger, guilt, grief or worry is sacrilege. For anything about a current reality to change, you have to change something within you first. Which is, you must be ready and willing to go to work on your problem regardless of circumstance, outcome, reward or recognition. Just keep chipping away. When the going gets tough again, when you face rejection, failure and hit another no-go place, you may well face another bout of depression and frustration. Hold your depression again and examine its futility. Then let it all go. And you go back to work, to chipping away at your problem. One day, one day surely, what you are chipping away at will give way. And that day, when you connect the dots backward, you will be grateful for the choice you made – to have gone to work on your problem than sit and bemoan it!   

Your ‘Mahamaham’ moment awaits you – not in Kumbakonam, but within you!

A dip in a ‘holy’ river or tank can never ‘cleanse’ you. Pausing, reflecting and awakening alone can.

A friend feverishly texted me on WhatsApp a few days ago. He’s close to me and believes that the financial challenges that my family and I are enduring, for close to a decade now, is directly related to my past karma– a ‘carry forward’ of sorts of ‘sins committed in a previous birth’. He furiously appealed to me I must make the pilgrimage to the Mahamaham tank in Kumbakonam and take a dip to ‘wash away all my bad karma, my sins’. “You will see an immediate change in your fortunes,” he insisted. I merely thanked him for his compassionate perspective and offered no justification for my choice not to accept his advice.

Mahamaham – Kumbakonam Picture Courtesy: Internet

The Mahamaham is a Hindu festival that happens every 12 years in the Mahamaham tank in Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu. I have no disrespect for the Mahamaham. Nor do I intend questioning its legend that’s drawing several millions in (what they think is) piety. Yet, I sincerely don’t believe a ritualistic dip, however ‘holy’ the site may be, can ever cleanse anyone. In his memorable 2003 classic, Anbe Sivam (Love is God), Kamal Hassan beautifully explains to his co-star Madhavan why the God within us – the Universal Energy that keeps us alive – must awaken for us to realize the magic and beauty of Life. That realization, to me, is the biggest awakening. And only an awakening from within can truly cleanse us.

To be sure, there is a Mahamaham moment waiting for each of us – provided we are ready and willing to understand Life and have seeker’s, a student’s, attitude. And that moment need not be at a temple tank, where millions are crowding with a herd mentality, throwing personal and public hygiene to the wind! My own Mahamaham moment happened in my living room, some time in 2007, when I was having my favorite Royal Challenge whisky, and was utterly bored with two other things I was trying to do at the same time – swap channels on TV hoping to find something interesting and make sense of the English translation of the Sai Satcharita, a book on the Life and teachings of Shirdi Sai Baba. My search for something meaningful on TV drew a blank. And I soon turned it off. My family had long gone to sleep. Even as I poured myself another drink, I tried – but failed miserably – to understand what the Sai Satcharita was trying to say – it will easily rank as among the most horrible works of translation ever, from the original Marathi to English! I put the book away. And I thought deeply about what Shirdi Baba had taught the world in his lifetime. In a Eureka-like flash, it dawned on me that the two principles around which all his teachings were anchored are – Shraddha, Faith and Saburi, Patience. To face Life and to overcome the challenges that you are faced with, I realized that, you must keep the faith and learn to be patient.

Over time, I employed this awakening very constructively, through my daily practice of mouna (silence periods), to understand the impermanence and inscrutability of Life. I learned that this is the only Life we have. And to live this Life well – and happily – we must train our mind to be in the present moment. In the now. I discovered that the way religion is practiced in the world today is that it encourages you and me to fear people (who peddle religion) than inspire faith in creation – that if you have been created without your asking to be born, then the same energy that created you will care for you, will provide for you. When there is fear, how can there be faith? When there is no faith, how can you be patient?   

This clarity is helping me live my Life with total inner peace, despite the storm that rages on outside, in my business, professional and material Life. This clarity makes me believe that a dip in an insanely crowded temple tank will hardly cleanse anything – not even your body, let alone your mind. I am more with Kabir, the 15^thCentury weaver-poet, here. He said:

Kabir Man Nirmal Bhaya, Jaise Ganga Neer 

Pache Pache Har Phire, Kahat Kabir Kabir

Translation

Kabir Washed His Mind Clean, Like The Holy Ganges River

Everyone follows behind, Saying Kabir, Kabir

That is, Kabir urges us to remove all impurities from our mind, from our thinking process, thus letting the light of divinity to shine forth. Truly, there is divinity in each of us. That divinity is suppressed, lying buried under layers and layers of grief, guilt, anger, fear and such debilitating emotions. This is why we are searching for God outside of us. This is why we are running to a Mahamaham.

Seriously, you don’t need to wait for 12 years to scramble to a Mahamaham for cleansing yourself. Your Mahamaham moment awaits you if you can simply pause, reflect and awaken to the opportunity of cleansing your mind, of living in the now! 

Forgiving someone is the best gift you can give yourself

Forgiveness means to accept people for who they are. Irrespective of their irrationality, of their attitude towards you and of their actions.

I recently met a business associate who had failed to fulfil his contractual obligation to my erstwhile (and now defunct) Firm.

It had been a messy relationship. He was paid a sum of money in lieu of his services that he never delivered. When my Firm demanded the money back, he stonewalled us and refused to even take my calls. I sent him a strongly worded email to which he never replied. So, it was in these circumstances that this person and I met at social event. He was courteous but he was both uncomfortable in my presence and, most certainly, unapologetic. Sensing his discomfort, I clasped his hands, and looking him in the eye said, “Let bygones be bygones. I know we have an issue pending. But I am not carrying any grudges any more. I am sorry if I have hurt you in any way over the episode we both wished had never happened.” That kind of lightened the atmosphere and we spent the rest of the evening drinking and chatting up! 

I am not even sitting in judgment of what I did as right or wrong. I simply forgave the person. Period.

I have learned from Life that nobody is bad. Nobody is out to fix anyone! People do what they do because they believe they are right in doing so. Or they think if they didn’t do so, something grave is going to happen to them. Or if they didn’t do what they are doing, they may not get what they expect from you. All irrational behavior by someone then is a manifestation of what they are thinking, their belief systems at that moment, which again is a reflection of the time that they are going through. Such behavior needs to be responded with compassion not hatred. These people need your understanding. They need your forgiveness, not your anger. Besides, if you think deeply about it, what purpose does anger serve? You burn in it, while the person at whom you are directing your rage is often totally nonplussed about how you are feeling.

To truly forgive means to give someone your deepest understanding. It means to let go of the need to judge, opine, analyze or justify and to simply accept the diversity in human Life. It also means to appreciate that people will think different, behave different from you, because they are different from you!  Besides, forgiving someone unburdens you of all the excess baggage of anger, hatred, grief and suffering that you will otherwise carry around. Forgiving someone who has hurt you is the best gift you can give yourself. Think about it. This awareness can make your Life beautiful!

Why forsake your freedom for someone else’s folly?

Some people you meet in Life will be cantankerous, scheming and unethical to the core. Let them be.

Recently someone we know worked in a despicable manner against our interest. It was hurting to see how we were treated and how our self-esteem was trampled upon. We did not protest. We did not whine. We did not rant. We did not fight. We merely exited from the relationship.

10 years ago, I would have kicked up a ruckus. I would have fought. I would have wanted to get even. I would have pushed hard to justify ourselves. I remember during one ghastly episode (which I have shared in my Book “Fall Like A Rose Petal”) with an unethical client, in 2003, I launched a 45-minute tirade against the CFO of the client’s company over the phone. It was a monologue – only I spoke, actually, I howled non-stop for those 45 minutes! When I was tired and done, and could bawl no more, the gentleman at the other end of the line calmly said, “Never waste your energy banging your head against a wall, AVIS. Not worth it.” But I did not heed his sage counsel. I threatened him and his company of dire consequences. For weeks on end, I tried to pursue options to sue them in international courts (they are an MNC). It was very late in the day when I realized I had I wasted precious time and inner peace on a dead cause.

Mercifully, I am not that way anymore. This is what Life has taught me: People will be who they are. And what they do to you, need not__and must not__change the way you deal with them. A common response we, good, ethical, warm and kind folks, have to such people is that we become depressive or angry or vengeful. This only creates more negative energy in us. And that, you will agree, is simply not worth inviting into your Life!

Here’s a Zen story which is awakening.

Two monks were washing their bowls in the river when they noticed a scorpion that was drowning. One monk immediately scooped it up and set it upon the bank. In the process the scorpion stung him. Unmindful, he went back to washing his bowl and again the scorpion fell into the river and began drowning. The monk saved the scorpion one more time and was again stung.

The other monk, who was watching this spectacle, asked him, “Friend, why do you continue to save the scorpion when you know it’s nature is to sting?”

“Because,” the first monk replied, “to save it is my nature.”

So, stay true to your nature. And let no one affect it. This does not mean you must suffer in silence. There surely are other means to express yourself than to retaliate in a similar manner as the one who’s causing you pain. When you are filled with anger and act from that impulse, you breed negativity in you. When you are negative, your inner peace gets affected. When your inner peace is disturbed, you are held hostage by debilitating emotions. And that essentially means you are not living free!

Think about it: Do you really want to forsake your freedom because someone acted foolishly?