Anger is a gift?
After watching Angrybot (this cool flash cartoon from We Are Robots), I noticed I became irritable. I’d tell people on MSN to shut up (amongst other rude things :$). It almost felt good until I realised it was partly an effect from being exposed to the barrage of anger. Ok I’m not here to debate violence in the media and its influence. I’m just saying that at that point it was a factor in affecting me. Wallahu a’lam.
Reminded me of “priming experiments” which taps into our unconscious mentioned in blink (OK book, haven’t finished reading - what’s new :P). One such experiment had two groups of students do a scrambled-sentence test. One group got words like “aggressively”, “bold”, “rude” and “intrude” while the other group had words like “respect”, “considerate”, “patiently” and “polite”. They then made these students go down the hall after they’ve finished the test to talk to the experimenter (individually). When a student arrived at the experimenter’s room, he’d find the experimenter busy talking to another person standing in the doorway. The result? Students from the first group would get annoyed and eventually interrupt. The other group, most of them… would stand and wait politely for some time! Interesting, eh? Masha Allah.
Erm for those who didn’t quite get it, I’m too lazy to type up the whole text from the book. I’d recommend you to get the book yourself but I’m not too well-informed of it to do so, heh. I’ve read a couple of ‘bad’ reviews. But hey, everyone’s entitled to their own opinion… When it comes to such books, at least.
Ok, to sum it up, I do believe everything you’re exposed to has some impact on your life, even simple words. And when you’re exposed to a particular thing repeatedly, it has greater, more significant influence on you as a person.
What to do with anger in particular? Keep the powerful words of our Prophet sallallahu ‘alayhi wasallam in mind: La taghdab, la taghdab, la taghdab.
For moments in anger, you’d have in mind the word ANGER like “I’m ANGRY” but by remembering those blessed words, you remember the “LA” part which will cancel out the anger, insha Allah. It should help, amongst the other practial advice our beloved, sallallahu ‘alayhi wasallam, has given us. Read more here.
“Anger dwells only in the bosom of fools.” - Albert Einstein