Briefly Stated
Using Anger Well is an anger therapy group for adults.  People attend because they must repair a troubled relationship and/or reduce the risk of job loss due to poorly managed anger.

Some struggle with "explosive" anger (a volatile temper or sudden loss of control).  Some struggle with "aggressive anger" (chronic nastiness or irritability, or a belittling, controlling attitude toward others).  And others struggle with "inhibited" anger (suppressed rage, passive defiance or punitive withdrawal).

Aware that these behaviors harm themselves, their loved ones and their employability, group members learn how to constructively handle rage, hostility and conflict.

Goal of the Group
The goal of the group is to learn healthy ways of experiencing and expressing anger.  To help you achieve this, we start with the basics.

First, we assume that your anger tells a story about your life.  We ask you to look inward at your thoughts and feelings and outward at your circumstances and behavior to understand what your anger says about you.

Second, we distinguish between healthy and unhealthy anger. Healthy anger is emotional and behavioral energy skillfully applied: it protects and supports vital emotional needs and interests. Unhealthy anger is energy destructively applied: it endangers personal well-being and harms important ties to others.  We observe how these contrasting forms of anger play out in the group and in your life beyond the group.

Third, your anger (and the anger people feel toward you) is a response to events for which you must hold yourself accountable. However hurt, offended, frustrated or scared you may be, controlling your anger is your responsibility.  Only you can make yourself angry.  For this reason, we ask you to see your part in the negativity and conflict that troubles you.

Finally, we know that the art of using anger well is not easy...but we know it is doable.  The payoff for learning to effectively discipline your anger is that you produce better answers to the problems that anger presents in your daily life.

What We Do in the Group
We are committed to productive group interaction.  To support the anger-solutions that work that work best in the context of your life, we ask you to become curious about the meaning of your anger and the anger that others have toward you.

Balancing the fundamental need for emotional safety and comfort with the necessary emotional "stretching" that promotes learning and growth, we accept you as you are.  At the same time, we challenge you to see new possibilities, to plan fresh strategies, and to test your skills at resolving your negativity and conflicts.

To do this...

► We explore how anger has functioned in your important relationships both past and present.  We learn about your pattern of anger-arousal and your style of emotion-regulation (how you run from, bottle-up or blow-up with anger).  And we come to know first-hand how you manage and mis-manage your own anger and the anger of others.

► We help you identify the situational triggers, relationship needs and personal beliefs that influence your judgment and behavior. We help you spot the circumstances that generate your destructive aggressive and/or passive anger; and we help you cultivate the conditions that produce your effective anger (when your anger is used well).

►  We study the cycles of conflict that undermine your interactions with others.  And we challenge you to become...