As an enneagram 8, I share the same secret as the Hulk – I’m always angry. Anger is how I live. It’s my default. My constant companion. Like a shadow on a sunny day, my anger never leaves me. I used to be ashamed about my anger, believing that the emotion itself was sinful. I thought I had to choose between giving full vent to my anger OR withdrawing from life and my loved ones to protect them from the anger beast that lives within me. I’d heard of people who had worked on their anger and had “come a long way.” I figured they did what I’d tried – lock the anger beast away in a well-guarded vault to protect those I love.
Fortunately, I found another way. By utilizing some Internal Family Systems (IFS) methods, I have been able to – instead of avoiding my anger and trying to ignore it, embrace it – I know that sounds crazy.What I DON’T mean is that I’ve handed my anger a lit torch to light up everything that ignites its fury. What I DO mean is that I have tried to view my anger through the eyes of curiosity and compassion. Through God’s eyes. When I look at my anger through that lens I realize that, though my secondary emotion is often anger, the primary emotion underneath it is usually something very tender and vulnerable – usually love.
Like two colors blending together, when my love is mixed with either fear, grief, or a sense of helplessness, it almost always results in anger:
Love + Helplessness = Anger.
By making my anger the enemy, I only fuel its fear and grief, making it bigger. Embracing it through God’s lens helped me see its goodness. God is an angry God, using His anger artfully for justice and protection. Without His anger, we wouldn’t grasp His deep desire for justice or the weight of His broken heart when His adulterous people betray Him. Remember Jesus braiding a whip and flipping tables in the Temple? His anger was necessary to confront the appalling reality.
The Bible doesn’t say, “Do not be angry.” Rather, it says, “In your anger do not sin.” This applies to any emotion: joy, comfort, and righteousness. Even love, when misused, can lead to detrimental actions. Human history is filled with heinous acts committed in the name of love. Anger is not the enemy; like love, it can be used for good or evil. These emotions can serve God’s purpose or our own. They can rule us or we can submit them to Christ.
With this perspective, those with much anger need not fear it. We don’t have to be governed by it. Instead, we can use anger as a conduit for deep connections with God and ourselves. Some of my most powerful moments with God occur when I’m angry over something beyond my control. Turning to Him in anger, I find He often shares my anger. This connection eases my loneliness. When I look deeper, I see God’s grief alongside His anger, helping me gain perspective. This makes me feel connected to Him in my anger and grief, instead of feeding a disconnection that usually only fuels my anger further. It’s this perspective and connection with God that helps me strive for a Heart Set Above, even in my anger.
Let me give you an example. It’s a heavy one:
On December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza shot and killed 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Twenty of them were children between six and seven years old; the other six were adult staff members. I was in my twenties then, childless, yet seethed with rage when I heard the news. Even now, angry tears run down my cheeks as I recount this story.
I was at work when I heard and thought I had properly sealed up the rage monster inside me to get through the day. That night, I snapped at my friend and roommate. I apologized, saying, “I’m sorry I said that. I don’t know what’s wrong with me today.” She replied, “I think you’re really affected by the Sandy Hook shooting and you don’t realize it.” I felt seen and validated. She was right. I thought I had pushed it to the back of my mind and moved on, but of course, I hadn’t. And in hindsight, I’m glad I didn’t. It was too big, too grief-worthy to ignore.
My friends gentle answer turned away my wrath, connecting me to her, to myself, and allowing my anger to cool into what it really was – grief and helplessness. Instead of hardening my heart and letting my anger burst out toward those I love, I turned to God and wept over this tragedy. I wept for the victims whose lives were cut short, for the parents who had to bury their children, for the survivors who were forever changed, and for the family of the perpetrator trying to make sense of this heinous act from their loved one.
In my grief, on my knees, weeping, I realized that God also grieved and mourned all these things. When I became aware of God’s grief, it made it easier to see through His eyes. He mourned not only for the victims, their families, and their community, but also for the perpetrator. God must have grieved for His beloved child and the pain that led him to such a terrible act. Seeing more through God’s eyes, I began to envision the cascading ripple effects of The Fall on humanity. Tracing this act back, I saw the ultimate blame lies with Satan for his lies and with humanity for choosing a path other than God’s, ultimately leading to the fall and eventually, this terrible act.
Through this perspective and my connection with God in that moment, my compassion intensified. I was able to feel more compassion for myself, for God, for the victims, and even for the perpetrator. I was still angry, but it was now an anger wrapped in compassion and surrender. I believe this is closer to what God may have felt in that moment and certainly closer to the heart that God calls me to have. I cried as I told God that I hate the evil of this world; but, surrendered, I confessed to Him, “I have no power here. Only You do.”
Though this process took more heart-effort, it was a more effective way to work through my anger than letting it simmer, eroding my compassion and surrender, hardening my heart, and further disconnecting me from God, my loved ones, and myself. So, take heart, fellow Hulkers! Our anger can be a conduit to being refined more into the image of God. It can serve as a conduit for connection – to ourselves, our loved ones, our enemies – and most importantly, to God.
Here are some practical steps to process through anger instead of allowing it to control you:
Recognize and name the primary emotion underneath the anger (e.g., hurt, fear, inadequacy, helplessness, love, grief).
Have compassion for your anger and thank it for trying to protect you or others.
Turn to God and let Him see and soothe your grief, fear, or hurt
Extend compassion to God, recognizing His grief as a Parent to fallen children, seeing through His eyes.
Use this new perspective to see a fuller picture of the situation, tracing the origin of heartache back to The Fall.
Surrender control to God.
Allow God to comfort you in your helplessness, assured by His mighty power and love.
I asked Chat GPT to make an ode to anger based on this article. I think it did a pretty good job:
