How do you lose anger?

This is what separates the enlightened mind from the unenlightened
mind and why enlightenment can't be forced on someone.

Can you force someone to lose the anger if they are not ready to?

Tired of being angry?

Just relinquish control and anger will be diminished.

Anger and control go hand in hand.

Some of these tendencies come from habit other times they stem from
ignorance. Either way we can change our habits or extinguish ignorance
with knowledge, mindfulness and practice. The first step is
realization that something is disturbing our peace needs to be
changed, so glad you have taken this first step for without
realization that there is a problem nothing can be done. I get stuck
here as well with wrong thoughts and wrong speech and am thankful for
your post as a reminder to be on guard of this tendency and to work on
being mindful of the Buddhist eightfold path. I already have the
knowledge but sometimes am not mindful of walking the path.

On page 90 of the AA's 12 and 12 the writers mention how the addict
cannot afford "justifiable anger" and it should be left to those
better qualified to handle it. With reference to this statement -- it
is gospel - there is no argument here. We can always settle such
disputes by looking deeply into the person, place, thing or emotion in
question and ask if it helps or hurts our practice? Does having anger
and hatred in our hearts ever increase our peace or serenity or does
it diminish it? Even is we are justified, so called, in having this
emotion does it suddenly become a peace generator in our life with
this newfound license to hate or is it still a peace buster whether we
have an excuse or not? The path is clear about which direction to take
and all that remains is the release of the anger.

Some people get confused with this anger question and beat themselves
for still experiencing this emotion thinking they should be a
"perfectly spiritual individual" and above such lowly emotions as
getting angry. They think they can perfect their lives and wipe out
natural law with one blow called spirituality. Due to the diversity of
thought we humans are capable of we have all sorts of thoughts and
emotions that pop up in our heads. Without this ability we could not
think as we do. But, just because thoughts or emotions pop up in our
heads the choice is ours alone whether we foster and build on any
particular thought or emotion. Spirituality does not eliminate such
thoughts - it just helps decide what we do with them.

Anger is also part of our natural make up. Anger is an emotions that
can serve us when we need to summon it up in a life or death situation
such as self defense or when our species had to hunt big game for a
living - hunt with spears, clubs and rocks. Even if we are dealing
with life or death self defense and must generate anger, the
byproducts is still a disruption of our peace as we recover from the
circumstance as a shaking and rattled mess. So, even if anger is
justified, so called, it does not magically become a peace promoter in
our lives instead of a peace destroyer. Anger is also an important
emotion for self preservation in less dangerous circumstances than big
game hunts, for without feeling anger we wound not seek out change -
changing our environment that might be an unhealthy one for us. So, we
should never regret feeling anger, but just as anger and excretion are
two naturally occurring parts of being a human, we should let them
serve us instead of we being enslaved to them.

But, I am here to remind you that besides justified anger, there are
HUNDREDS of other things that one cannot "afford" in their life is
they desire inner peace. Sure, we can all white knuckle it and just
scrape by with, ready to slip off at a moments notice if we want to
put our desires before our practice. But, learning what fits and what
does not fit comfortably in our life is the ongoing battle we all have
to undertake if we want peace. In short, we have to ask if our
practice can "afford" the many things we come into daily contact with
and the measure of our success will be determined by how well we live
within our comfortable means by asking this "affordability" question.

Before I could find lasting and peaceful recovery I had to learn to
refuse many areas of my old life that did not serve me any longer.
This is how I coined the phrase, "You are not recovering until your
start refusing...refusing the old sick ways that got you here." The 3
paths that addiction (Yes, anger is addictive) can take are these: the
addiction can be increased, it can be decreased or can be frozen.
These 3 paths shows us which direction we are headed in with our
recovery at any given moment. Clarity about affordability comes from a
continual orientation of putting our programs wants first and our
personal wants or desires second and by asking the question of how any
person, place, thing or activity will affect my recovery program? Once
the addict has this affordability mindset in place they can direct
their thoughts towards the cultivation of recovery, so that whatever
action they are engaged in - it is always evaluated from this
perspective and they can find great success from applying this single
minded dedication to change. Suddenly they find their recovery
practice and life can become as one and asking such questions becomes
second nature for them.

But again, this is the textbook or idealistic way of looking at this
affordability question, we need practical application in the real
world. Many of us have families and jobs and to be a total renunciate
of all things disruptive to our peace and our recovery program is not
always possible or desirable when looking at the big picture. I often
hear excuses from other addicts saying they can't stop this or that
because of their family, jobs or other obligations, so we need to
balance these two extremes of being a total renunciate with the other
extreme of being paralyzed and not changing a thing because of excuses
and justification. We have to work towards a balance if we want peace
and just like exercise, we always seem to find reasons for not doing
what we know is right.

The way I work it is to be aware of what is disruptive to my peace and
to change it if possible as a first choice or work on accepting it as
the serenity prayer says as a second choice. I try to stay away from
justification or looking for excuses to continue on the wrong path. I
either change things or work on accepting them. If we base our
decisions of proven principles of recovery it helps takes us out of
the decision making process and rests our recovery on solid foundation
instead of excuses. I don't beat myself for not being able to perform
well in every given circumstance under the sun. I know that I do not
mesh well with everything and everybody in life and I have certain
limits and abilities. To do otherwise would say that we have the right
to be perfect and violate our make up and that we have no limits or
boundaries to govern us and are godlike. The 12 step programs reminds
us to work within our limits by "staying right size" on pages 122-125,
so it tells me right there I am not immune to all things destructive
just because I work the 12 steps.

In SCA they have a tool called abstention. They abstain the best way
they can from people places or things they have found to be
detrimental to their recovery program efforts from past experience
with them. My recovery success is based a lot on abstaining from
people, places and things that do not mesh well with me and if I
cannot avoid them, then I work to make the unavoidable fit better by
changing things on my end. Yes, we cannot change others, but we do
usually have control of ourselves and how we participate in dealing
with others. Even though we cannot completely change or wipe our many
problem areas in our life we can usually change *some* aspects of most
problems to make them more bearable. So, I am always looking for small
changes to make in the right direction and this recovery orientation
towards the direction of change helps by giving hope of possible
larger future change as well.

In addition you can work practice a meditation on the 4 Immeasurables
aka Divine States of Dwelling. Radiate the 4 Immeasurables in all 4
directions as well, as above and below you so it emanates from your
being throughout the universe.

Meditate on:

Limitless Compassion for all suffering beings.
Limitless Joy for over the salvation of others from suffering
Limitless Peace for all beings whether friend or enemy
Limitless Kindness towards all sentient beings.

But bottom line is either you must change from the inside out - or
life will change you 'its way' from the outside in and this tends to
rot your insides.

Take care,


V (Male)(who gives a damn?)

Agnostic Freethinker
Practical Philosopher
AA#2

How do you lose anger?

How do you lose anger?

This is what separates the enlightened mind from the unenlightened
mind and why enlightenment can't be forced on someone.

Can you force someone to lose the anger if they are not ready to?

Tired of being angry?

Just relinquish control and anger will be diminished.

Anger and control go hand in hand.

Some of these tendencies come from habit other times they stem from
ignorance. Either way we can change our habits or extinguish ignorance
with knowledge, mindfulness and practice. The first step is
realization that something is disturbing our peace needs to be
changed, so glad you have taken this first step for without
realization that there is a problem nothing can be done. I get stuck
here as well with wrong thoughts and wrong speech and am thankful for
your post as a reminder to be on guard of this tendency and to work on
being mindful of the Buddhist eightfold path. I already have the
knowledge but sometimes am not mindful of walking the path.

On page 90 of the AA's 12 and 12 the writers mention how the addict
cannot afford "justifiable anger" and it should be left to those
better qualified to handle it. With reference to this statement -- it
is gospel - there is no argument here. We can always settle such
disputes by looking deeply into the person, place, thing or emotion in
question and ask if it helps or hurts our practice? Does having anger
and hatred in our hearts ever increase our peace or serenity or does
it diminish it? Even is we are justified, so called, in having this
emotion does it suddenly become a peace generator in our life with
this newfound license to hate or is it still a peace buster whether we
have an excuse or not? The path is clear about which direction to take
and all that remains is the release of the anger.

Some people get confused with this anger question and beat themselves
for still experiencing this emotion thinking they should be a
"perfectly spiritual individual" and above such lowly emotions as
getting angry. They think they can perfect their lives and wipe out
natural law with one blow called spirituality. Due to the diversity of
thought we humans are capable of we have all sorts of thoughts and
emotions that pop up in our heads. Without this ability we could not
think as we do. But, just because thoughts or emotions pop up in our
heads the choice is ours alone whether we foster and build on any
particular thought or emotion. Spirituality does not eliminate such
thoughts - it just helps decide what we do with them.

Anger is also part of our natural make up. Anger is an emotions that
can serve us when we need to summon it up in a life or death situation
such as self defense or when our species had to hunt big game for a
living - hunt with spears, clubs and rocks. Even if we are dealing
with life or death self defense and must generate anger, the
byproducts is still a disruption of our peace as we recover from the
circumstance as a shaking and rattled mess. So, even if anger is
justified, so called, it does not magically become a peace promoter in
our lives instead of a peace destroyer. Anger is also an important
emotion for self preservation in less dangerous circumstances than big
game hunts, for without feeling anger we wound not seek out change -
changing our environment that might be an unhealthy one for us. So, we
should never regret feeling anger, but just as anger and excretion are
two naturally occurring parts of being a human, we should let them
serve us instead of we being enslaved to them.

But, I am here to remind you that besides justified anger, there are
HUNDREDS of other things that one cannot "afford" in their life is
they desire inner peace. Sure, we can all white knuckle it and just
scrape by with, ready to slip off at a moments notice if we want to
put our desires before our practice. But, learning what fits and what
does not fit comfortably in our life is the ongoing battle we all have
to undertake if we want peace. In short, we have to ask if our
practice can "afford" the many things we come into daily contact with
and the measure of our success will be determined by how well we live
within our comfortable means by asking this "affordability" question.

Before I could find lasting and peaceful recovery I had to learn to
refuse many areas of my old life that did not serve me any longer.
This is how I coined the phrase, "You are not recovering until your
start refusing...refusing the old sick ways that got you here." The 3
paths that addiction (Yes, anger is addictive) can take are these: the
addiction can be increased, it can be decreased or can be frozen.
These 3 paths shows us which direction we are headed in with our
recovery at any given moment. Clarity about affordability comes from a
continual orientation of putting our programs wants first and our
personal wants or desires second and by asking the question of how any
person, place, thing or activity will affect my recovery program? Once
the addict has this affordability mindset in place they can direct
their thoughts towards the cultivation of recovery, so that whatever
action they are engaged in - it is always evaluated from this
perspective and they can find great success from applying this single
minded dedication to change. Suddenly they find their recovery
practice and life can become as one and asking such questions becomes
second nature for them.

But again, this is the textbook or idealistic way of looking at this
affordability question, we need practical application in the real
world. Many of us have families and jobs and to be a total renunciate
of all things disruptive to our peace and our recovery program is not
always possible or desirable when looking at the big picture. I often
hear excuses from other addicts saying they can't stop this or that
because of their family, jobs or other obligations, so we need to
balance these two extremes of being a total renunciate with the other
extreme of being paralyzed and not changing a thing because of excuses
and justification. We have to work towards a balance if we want peace
and just like exercise, we always seem to find reasons for not doing
what we know is right.

The way I work it is to be aware of what is disruptive to my peace and
to change it if possible as a first choice or work on accepting it as
the serenity prayer says as a second choice. I try to stay away from
justification or looking for excuses to continue on the wrong path. I
either change things or work on accepting them. If we base our
decisions of proven principles of recovery it helps takes us out of
the decision making process and rests our recovery on solid foundation
instead of excuses. I don't beat myself for not being able to perform
well in every given circumstance under the sun. I know that I do not
mesh well with everything and everybody in life and I have certain
limits and abilities. To do otherwise would say that we have the right
to be perfect and violate our make up and that we have no limits or
boundaries to govern us and are godlike. The 12 step programs reminds
us to work within our limits by "staying right size" on pages 122-125,
so it tells me right there I am not immune to all things destructive
just because I work the 12 steps.

In SCA they have a tool called abstention. They abstain the best way
they can from people places or things they have found to be
detrimental to their recovery program efforts from past experience
with them. My recovery success is based a lot on abstaining from
people, places and things that do not mesh well with me and if I
cannot avoid them, then I work to make the unavoidable fit better by
changing things on my end. Yes, we cannot change others, but we do
usually have control of ourselves and how we participate in dealing
with others. Even though we cannot completely change or wipe our many
problem areas in our life we can usually change *some* aspects of most
problems to make them more bearable. So, I am always looking for small
changes to make in the right direction and this recovery orientation
towards the direction of change helps by giving hope of possible
larger future change as well.

In addition you can work practice a meditation on the 4 Immeasurables
aka Divine States of Dwelling. Radiate the 4 Immeasurables in all 4
directions as well, as above and below you so it emanates from your
being throughout the universe.

Meditate on:

Limitless Compassion for all suffering beings.
Limitless Joy for over the salvation of others from suffering
Limitless Peace for all beings whether friend or enemy
Limitless Kindness towards all sentient beings.

But bottom line is either you must change from the inside out - or
life will change you 'its way' from the outside in and this tends to
rot your insides.






Take care,


V (Male)

Agnostic Freethinker
Practical Philosopher
AA#2