I get mad. You get mad. Your Mom gets mad. Your Dad gets mad. Hey, even God gets mad. Let’s face it, at one time or another EVERYBODY gets mad! Anger is a normal human emotion and it is the way that your subconscious mind releases mental and emotional pressure but sometimes this normal psychological function can run amok and lead you astray. Getting angry is normal, letting anger get the best of you is not. So how do you know if your anger is getting out of control and what can you do about it if you’re raging? Surprisingly enough recognizing and managing anger is relatively easy, here’s how!

Your anger is out of control if…

• you find yourself getting angry at everything that inconveniences you, annoys you or otherwise gets in the way of what you want to be doing,
• it leads you to act out aggressively or violently as in yelling, ranting, hitting, shoving or plotting revenge,
• it consumes you long after the event has passed, if you dwell on the things that make you angry then you’re in trouble because normal anger is only a temporary emotional response to unsettling eternal stimuli,
• things that didn’t used to make you angry are suddenly major issues worthy of a rant, this does not apply to times when you have suppressed normal anger only to times that anger really isn’t merited, for example when somebody gets a higher grade than you or when a person is taking too long in the bathroom,
• you find yourself doing self destructive things to cope with your angry feelings, such as reckless driving, hazardous recreational activities, physical fighting, drugs and alcohol or, unsafe or random sexual activity.