Areas › Anger › Equanimity and perspective
Losing your grip has a sequence too, running the other way: the hold loosens, thinking thins out, and then you are simply angry. Finding where it loosened is more use than going over how it ended.
Work backwards from the flare. The slip is usually earlier and duller than the shouting: a skipped meal, a second replay of the conversation in the car, a message read at midnight. That earlier point is where next time's effort belongs.
Qur’an and Sunnah
when the earth has taken on its finest appearance, and adorns itself, and its people think they have power over it (Quran 10:24). The moment you are most certain you have this handled is often the moment just before.
إِنَّمَا مَثَلُ ٱلۡحَيَوٰةِ ٱلدُّنۡيَا كَمَآءٍ أَنزَلۡنَٰهُ مِنَ ٱلسَّمَآءِ فَٱخۡتَلَطَ بِهِۦ نَبَاتُ ٱلۡأَرۡضِ مِمَّا يَأۡكُلُ ٱلنَّاسُ وَٱلۡأَنۡعَٰمُ حَتَّىٰٓ إِذَآ أَخَذَتِ ٱلۡأَرۡضُ زُخۡرُفَهَا وَٱزَّيَّنَتۡ وَظَنَّ أَهۡلُهَآ أَنَّهُمۡ قَٰدِرُونَ عَلَيۡهَآ أَتَىٰهَآ أَمۡرُنَا لَيۡلًا أَوۡ نَهَارࣰ ا فَجَعَلۡنَٰهَا حَصِيدࣰ ا كَأَن لَّمۡ تَغۡنَ بِٱلۡأَمۡسِۚ كَذَٰلِكَ نُفَصِّلُ ٱلۡأٓيَٰتِ لِقَوۡمࣲ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ
The life of this world is like this: rain that We send down from the sky is absorbed by the plants of the earth, from which humans and animals eat. But when the earth has taken on its finest appearance, and adorns itself, and its people think they have power over it, then the fate We commanded comes to it, by night or by day, and We reduce it to stubble, as if it had not flourished just the day before. This is the way We explain the revelations for those who reflect
Qur’an 10:24read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
In a randomised waitlist controlled trial, 145 ninth grade students with raised mood symptoms took a twelve week school mindfulness programme, and emotion regulation outcomes improved for some subgroups. Training people to watch their own emotional sequence is workable, and the honest reading is that it helped some of them rather than all. Subgroup results need treating with care.
Fung J, Kim JJ, Jin J, Chen G, Bear L, Lau AS. (2019). A Randomized Trial Evaluating School-Based Mindfulness Intervention for Ethnic Minority Youth: Exploring Mediators and Moderators of Intervention Effects.. Journal of abnormal child psychology doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
You can only step in at a point you can see, so finding the slip gives you somewhere to put the effort.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
Some reactions really do just happen, like a wind up toy pointed forwards, banging into whatever is in the way. That is a description of the problem rather than an excuse for it.
Old traditions worked this out a long time ago: someone who cannot be certain they are right cannot be righteously cruel. Doubt is not weakness here, it is what keeps the hand down.
When someone protests that swallowing their feelings is unnatural, agree with them, because it is. Then add the part they have not said: it is also necessary, and there are better ways to do it than swallowing.