Assertiveness is a communication style. It is the ability to express your feelings, thoughts, beliefs, and opinions in a direct, respectful and open manner that doesn’t violate the rights of others.

If we do express ourselves openly and conceal our thoughts and feelings this can make us feel tense, stressed, anxious or resentful. It possibly would lead to unhealthy and uncomfortable relationships as we don’t feel safe and loves while not allowing people closest to us to really know us.

The main effect of not being assertive is that it leads to low self esteem. If we communicate in a passive manner we are not saying what we really feel or think. This means we can end up agreeing with and fulfilling other people’s needs or wants rather than our own. Lack of expression of needs might leads to depression. This can result in a lack of purpose, and a feeling of not being in control of our own lives.

Lack of assertiveness is also very common in social phobia. People with social anxiety tend to think that other people are being judgmental and critical about them and will avoid social situations because of this.

Being assertive involves first of all choosing to communicate – being active rather than passive – and then doing so in a manner that’s both respectful and honest. Becoming more assertive is rewarding as it increases your self-esteem and social ability and allows you to have more fulfilling life.

You need to feel good about yourself in order to cope with any problems and to have honest relationships with yourself and others. Anger can get in the way of feeling good and in times when anger is not manage properly and has no place to go, it may be turned into self-anger. This means that anger is directed against you and can lead to self-destructive behaviors like excessive drinking, drug use, gambling or even anxiety, depression, physical illnesses and suicide attempts. Self-anger makes you feel like you cannot stand yourself.

The antidote for self-anger is to feel good about yourself by developing your character and building yourself esteem. The first step in improving your self-esteem is to try to recognize the things make you angry with yourself. Try completing the following sentence, “I get angry at myself when . . .“ I don’t do as well as I should; I eat too much; I lose my temper; I don’t speak as I should; When I say stupid things etc.. These self-provocations are things that make you angry and are usually things where you have no one to blame but yourself. You need to learn how to work out these self-provocations. Failure to do this can lead to anger overload that can result in self-destructive patterns of behavior.

Once you identify your self-provocations, the next step is to develop strategies to overcome them. For Example, if your self-provocation is that you eat too much, resolve that next time you will eat more nutritionally and eat less. Secondly, do not kick yourself too hard when you are not successful. Allow yourself to be human (which you are). If your problem is that you get angry, you may need to exercise some relaxation techniques. When you encounter something that makes you angry with yourself, use the following statement, “What is the best thing for me to do now?” Remember to BE WISE, NOT RIGHT, which mean engage yourself in healthy and productive thoughts and actions. Your acknowledgment of the problem, and at the same time, focusing on improving the situation and getting better is the road to overcome anger. Merely sitting and belittling yourself over what has happened is not productive and even make anger worse.

In case of situations that are beyond our control or when we cannot make changes, we can develop the strategy of either learning to live with it or leaving the situation. Once you accept the fact that the source of the problem is not within you, it is easier to accept the provocation without developing self-anger.

The purpose of of anger management therapy is not to eliminate the anger, but to use it as a signal to indicate that there is a need that is not fulfilled. Through anger management counseling, individuals are taught how to slow down their arousal when angered, so that it can be processed and acted on in a proper, constructive and healthy way without the negative consequences when it is uncontrolled.

There are many triggers that can set off anger episodes. When anger is intense our ability to think is weaken. We often react immediately and worry about the consequences later. This can be dangerous and can make us feel ashamed and guilty later. Many times old immature habits from our childhood can be triggered and reenacted. Reacting to anger situations just keeps us stuck in the past and decreases our ability to change, mature and grow. Knowing what triggers anger inside us can be useful so that we can attempt to avoid or manage those triggers in healthy ways. Anger treatment with effective therapist can teach effective coping skills to create proactive, healthy, durable and fulfilling life while anger emotion is used toward building more mature character.

Anger can be very damaging to the body, mind and emotional state. Long and continual occurrence of stress from uncontrolled anger can have very negative effects. The members of the anger management group are taught skills for relaxation as well as ways to express anger safely and assertively.

Anger that is not acted upon constructively but rather accumulated can contribute to a passive-aggressive expression of anger, or even to depression. Parts of the lessons of the anger management group are to find ways to improve self-esteem, and to endure what is often a very stressful and hectic life. The group discusses ways to learn greater tolerance, improve empathy, and to forgive when necessary in order to let go and move on.

A key element to the group of anger management is the mutual support that each member provides to the other. Members often make very useful suggestions to others about what has worked for them and how others should appraise or deal with a difficult situation. Each Anger group is unique in many ways but I always find the experience rewarding. Many times the changes are dramatic and can be very beneficial.

There has been a debate in regards to anger management program and its usefulness in changing habitual angry behaviors that have been around with most adults for a lifetime. Statistics show the positive benefits of anger management with people who are actively involved in a quality program and practicing what they are learning on a daily basis.

Anger does have a best part. The best part of your angry behavior is that you are in charge of it and you control its outcome, which means that you have the power to change your response to anger for the better. The key is to have knowledge, skills, determination and the desire to manage your anger.

People attend a structured anger management program that tells them exactly what to do and how to manage their anger. However, sometimes, this general approach to anger management is that one program does not fit all. Everyone’s needs are different and who likes to be told what to do or what is right for their own life?

So, to attain the best result of anger management, a customized program is suggested. After all, you are the expert of your life and anger management comes from within you. You just might need some shaking up.

A flame like emotion is a primitive force, left unchecked is chaotic and destructive, but if controlled, it can be powerful tool. Like the lamp that controls the flame, our brain can control our emotions, and we as human can learn to manage our emotions in a constructive manner.

In the past (as a child), your anger was a source of strength and at time gave you courage while it protected you. It serves you as a “survival mechanism.” But, now, as an adult if you realize that you are not in this a survival situation, you can build a better mechanism to protect yourself and use the emotions as a signal and indicator to your status.

When you pay attention to this signal (the emotion) try stay with it and not to react to it. Then, you can slowly figure out what this signal means and what is your need. Once you realize your need, think and find a constructive way to express your need in a respectful assertive manner. It is important to note that expressing your needs does not necessary leads to fulfilling your needs. In this regards, one has to know what is within his power and what is beyond his power. All one can do it to do his best (with in his power) to get what he needs, yet accept what is beyond his power and accept it.

Originated in StarTrek and Adopted/Revised by Moshe Ratson

Anger is a strong emotion and an integral part of our lives. Like any other emotion, we have to accept the fact that we are going to feel angry. Yet, we can control the degree of anger we feel, and how we act and response to anger. The main strategy in managing anger starts by viewing provoking situations in a realistic, non-judgmental, non-personal and with sense of proportion. Then, responding in effective, constructive and assertive manner to the situation, which means neither overlooking the problem (being passive), nor overreacting (being aggressive).

The main challenge in controlling anger is to avoid acting impulsively despite the strong urge to react. The fight and flight response to protect and keep us safe is automatically triggered and is immediately ready to act like a soldier in a combat zone. The key is to deeply understand that we are not in a life and death situation and the alarm (anger) we experience is as a result of our emotional (animalistic) brain. The way to control our emotional brain is to give power to our relatively new cognitive mind. This can be done by not giving up to our emotions and immediately react. It requires patience and slowing down the anger response cycle. It is simply means doing the opposite of what we used to do for so many years and for many generations. In other words, rather than reacting and immediately protecting ourselves, we need to stop, take TIME-OUT to cool down ourselves while getting back to the situation ONLY when we can re-examine the issue in a realistic, non-judgmental, non-personal with sense of proportion. This process is clearly easier said than done, but by being aware of it and practicing it daily while developing our anger management skills, we can gradually improve our anger management and improve our habit to become emotionally strong. This process strengthens our cognitive mind to effectively bring us to a better emotional state and durable fulfillment.