Areas › Anger › Practising under provocation
The shape of the whole thing is simple. Find the judgement that stings, meet it, talk it through, meet it again with a different intention, talk it through, then mark that you did it.
The talking between rounds is not a break, it is where the moment turns into something you can use. Marking it at the end matters too. Saying plainly that you have now done a thing you believed you could not is what makes it retrievable later, when you need evidence about yourself. Finish by choosing where you will meet a smaller version of it this week.
Qur’an and Sunnah
Be patient with what they say (Quran 20:130). The verse goes on to set that patience inside a pattern repeated through the day, which is how this is meant to be built too.
فَٱصۡبِرۡ عَلَىٰ مَا يَقُولُونَ وَسَبِّحۡ بِحَمۡدِ رَبِّكَ قَبۡلَ طُلُوعِ ٱلشَّمۡسِ وَقَبۡلَ غُرُوبِهَاۖ وَمِنۡ ءَانَآيِٕ ٱلَّيۡلِ فَسَبِّحۡ وَأَطۡرَافَ ٱلنَّهَارِ لَعَلَّكَ تَرۡضَىٰ
so [Prophet] be patient with what they say- celebrate the praise of your Lord, before the rising and setting of the sun, celebrate His praise during the night, and at the beginning and end of the day, so that you may find contentment
Qur’an 20:130read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
A pilot programme run before deployment combined education, coping skills and rehearsal in that order, and proved workable and acceptable to the people in it. It was small and was not designed to show that it prevents anything. So it supports the shape of a staged practice rather than telling you how strong the effect is.
Hourani L, Tueller S, Kizakevich P, Lewis G, Strange L, Weimer B, Bryant S, Bishop E, Hubal R, Spira J. (2016). Toward Preventing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Development and Testing of a Pilot Predeployment Stress Inoculation Training Program.. Military medicine doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
Arousal alone teaches very little, and it becomes learning when you put words to it afterwards.
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
Run the same moment twice. The second time, change nothing except what you do with it, and let yourself not mind what the other person might be thinking.
Be careful with the language about growing a thicker skin. Before anyone is asked to mind less, someone has to check that what they are minding really is only a slight.
Let yourself be five minutes late to something that does not matter. Then ask how you would feel if a friend were five minutes late to you.