Anger Management Techniques: A 4 Step Plan

For some people, mastering anger management techniques comes naturally. For the rest of us, it's a skill to be learned. Thankfully, it's never too late to learn good relationship skills, including how to manage our anger.

Everyone experiences anger but when it gets out of control it's helpful to have some coping skills to rely on. The anger management techniques below can help.

It's a good idea to start with a specific plan in mind. Include in your plan specific anger management techniques that you can practice and gradually incorporate into your daily life. Below are some examples.

1) First, put some distance between you and the situation making you angry. Give yourself time to think and ask yourself questions, such as will this really matter in ten years? Or even two weeks?

2) Try going for a short brisk walk to clear your head.

3) Think about the ramifications of your actions. Ask yourself if the way in which you are thinking about reacting is likely to make the situation better or worse. Actions that might make you feel good or vindicated in the moment can lead to making the situation worse or end up harming you in the end. So, really try to think things through.

4) Visualization is another useful anger management technique. Imagine someone you admire responding to your situation in a calm, reasonable and mature manner and mimic their response.

By the time you do this, in many cases you will see that your anger has subsided.

It is never a good idea to "vent" anger by punching things or acting in a violent manner. These actions do not release anger but instead reinforce the feelings of rage and in essence are good practice for cultivating anger, not controlling it. Venting of anger actually ends up strengthening the neuronal connections associated with causing you to become angry and ends up priming the neurons to fire again. Scientists call this process kindling because you are literally kindling the fire within.

That's not to say that engaging in healthy venting such as a good cardiovascular workout is not effective; it is very effective and helps you to associate healthier ways of dealing with anger with a particular trigger.

Human beings are creatures of habit so when we practice good anger control techniques they soon become second nature.