Faith Venture

Be angry, but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not make room for the devil. —Ephesians

This thought is psychology genius. The writer grasps the depths of human emotion bringing it to light within the spiritual tradition.

Be Angry

Anger is going to visit us. We cannot avoid it. Even recognizing what triggers our anger response does not prevent the emotion.

Do Not Sin

This may be the hard part. When anger visits, what is our response? Can we find a way to avoid the explosion where words and actions create inevitable separation and hurt?

Therapists and gurus advise pausing. Good luck trying that at times. But it’s true. A pause, a breath helps. Cultivating a habit of self awareness also helps. My current meditation teacher, Henry Shukman, says, “We all have emotions. Through meditation we can become less identified with it and simply observers of it.”

Do Not Let The Sun Go Down On Your Anger

One of the most revered of the Desert Fathers, Abba Poeman, when asked about dwelling on these emotions, said, “The axe cannot cut down a tree by itself.”

Do not grab that axe handle of anger and use it. Let it lie. Get over it however works for you. Make any necessary apologies. (Hint: just say “I apologize” or “I am so sorry” and do not add any explanation.)

Do Not Make Room For The Devil

The longer we sit in anger, the more likely that our personality will change. We can become one of those bitter, offensive people whom we avoid. We draw apart from God. Prayer becomes impossible. Other people annoy us.

Close that door before it’s too late.

There is no greater obstacle to the presence of the spirit in us than anger. St. John of the Ladder

Anger hides inside devastating our attitude and love.

Anger explodes causing hurt, embarrassment, division, separation.

On the other hand, sometimes anger expressed clears the air leading to fruitful reconciliation. Sometimes anger motivates us to correct a wrong in the world around us.

Understand  your anger. Manage it. Deal with it.

Flashbacks of exploding in anger sometimes visit my conscious self. It’s embarrassing now. How frustrations or deep hurts overflowed into words and actions.

I could say that we live in an age of the angry young man where everyone is like that. Politicians around the world seem to be tapping into that anger. Except that angry young men have been around for decades—millennia even. Billy Joel released a song in 1976 described as a sardonic look at “the angry young man who will go to his grave as an angry old man.” 

Maybe I lost the edge of that anger when I became 25 or so and my brain finished growing (biological fact, in case you missed that in class). Or maybe years of meditation. Or maybe the times, especially in business, where I was metaphorically stabbed in the back by colleagues or friends, and I realized in the bigger picture, I was better off gone from that environment.

Looking at that bigger picture, would you like the vision of yourself as one of those angry old men (or women)? No one around you? Doing nothing for the family or community? Probably taking years from your life?

I can’t imagine that a person exists who doesn’t experience something sometime that lights a torch inside. A mark of maturity and growing spiritual awareness is revealed when we can let it go. Quickly. Before we say or do something foolish. Hitting that internal pause button before we hit the keyboard return button that will send that email or publish to social media.

How about if we go to our graves known as kind and compassionate rather than angry and bitter? We can do that. It does take work. And time.