And your anger at all the social injustice you’re seeing on your newsfeed? OK, that might just come from valid feelings of, well, anger.Īnd that’s the tricky part: Sometimes anger is a secondary emotion that masks a primary one like hurt, shame, envy, sadness, or helplessness. Your rage about the flight delay making you late for your friend’s event may stem from feelings of helplessness and frustration. If the tip of the iceberg is your obvious and visible anger, it can be helpful to consider the whole mess of emotions that could be lurking just beneath the surface.įor instance, your anger about your boss calling out your mistake in front of other coworkers may stem from emotions like embarrassment or shame. But there’s a lot more iceberg hidden beneath the water. Think of an iceberg floating in the ocean. It’s widely attributed to the Gottman Institute, an organization of psychologists and researchers that focuses on couples, family, and interpersonal relationship therapy. The anger iceberg is an analogy used to explain all the deeper emotions that can contribute to any particular bout of anger. That’s the thinking behind a psychological concept called the anger iceberg. One of the best ways to get your anger under control is to understand what’s behind it.

And when your anger is persistent and has nowhere to go, it can lead to some pretty nasty health issues and other stress-related side effects, which is why we don’t want to just let our anger stew and spiral. Of course, all that physical activation doesn’t really help you deal with your typical everyday stressors like Karen from accounting or politicians stripping away your rights. When you get angry, your sympathetic nervous system is activated, bringing on a fight-or-flight response, speeding up your heart rate, and leading to a surge of adrenaline that makes it easier for you to take physical action if needed. It’s a natural human emotion that actually serves an evolutionary purpose to protect us. Instead, I like to try asking if they are sad or hurt in an attempt to help them start expressing their feelings with words.Δ By subscribing to our email newsletter, you agree to and acknowledge that you have read our Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions.Īnger gets a bad rap but it isn’t always bad. Nor is it time to lecture them about their manners and behaviors. When the children or youth are angry, it is not time to reciprocate their emotions. Since anger is an indicator, the diagram above gives us a visual to help identify what is happening.

I have experienced similar reactions with teens who will emotionally push me away by acting rude or distant initially. I have had many fun times with them and their family in the past, but it was easier for them to be mad and reject me. I understood their anger was sadness and disappointment because of the time distance. Initially, they physically attempted to push me away many times as I walked into the room. It can be easy to assume a child’s anger stems from surface-level events, but more is underneath that behavior or attitude than we could imagine.įor example, I met for a session with a child client after a long unexpected absence, and they were very angry with me. What is the real reason behind our kid’s anger? Or perhaps the better question is, “What can we do about it? This anger iceberg diagram is one tool I’ve found to be useful in understanding how anger truly works beneath the surface.

Pdf anger iceberg