Anger management books I’ve posted about in the past include Anger: The Misunderstood Emotion by Carol Tavris and The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner. Below are three additional resources that readers find helpful.
I. Anger Management for Everyone: Ten Proven Strategies to Help You Control Anger and Live a Happier Life (Second Edition) by Raymond Chip Tafrate, PhD, and Howard Kassinove, PhD, ABPP (2019)
In this book two clinical psychologists combine their many years of experience using cognitive behavioral methods to teach how to manage anger issues. Featured are their own “Anger Episode Model” and their “ten proven-effective skills for anger management”:
- Strategy One: Manage your lifestyle to reduce overall stress.
- Strategy Two: Sidestep everyday provocations.
- Strategy Three: Find new solutions to social problems.
- Strategy Four: Change the way you think about your life.
- Strategy Five: Let it go instead of holding onto petty grievances.
- Strategy Six: Practice forgiveness toward yourself and others.
- Strategy Seven: Calm angry urges with relaxation, mindfulness, and meditation.
- Strategy Eight: Practice exposure techniques for healthier reactions.
- Strategy Nine: Improve your social and interpersonal communication skills.
- Strategy Ten: Express your anger in an assertive, productive way.
II. Mindful Anger: A Pathway to Emotional Freedom by Andrea Brandt, PhD (2014)
From the publisher of Mindful Anger: “Anger is one the most common human emotions, so if you’re not feeling it, then you’re probably unconsciously burying it. But anger that is buried isn’t actually gone. In fact, hidden or covert anger may be just as damaging as the overt, outwardly destructive kind, only it wreaks havoc from the inside-out. All sorts of physical and emotional problems can stem from suppressed anger: headaches, digestive problems, insomnia, just to name a few.”
Ways to overcome all levels of anger are addressed. Brandt’s “Mindful Anger” blog on Psychology Today, furthermore, has posts on such related-to-anger-management topics as grief, stress, depression, and relationships.
III. The Cow in the Parking Lot: A Zen Approach to Overcoming Anger by Leonard Scheff and Susan Edmiston (2010)
For this book journalist Edmiston assisted attorney Scheff, the creator of an anger management workshop based on Zen principles, in describing his approach that “shows how anger is based on unmet demands, from the reasonable (we want love from our partner) to the irrational (we want respect from a total stranger) to the impossible (we want someone to fix everything in our life),” per the publisher.
Emphasized is internal responsibility, as in the example of the cow in the parking lot: you might rage against another for taking your parking spot but laugh off finding a cow in the same spot. It’s not about “the other”—it’s about your own response.
“The authors show how, once we identify our real unmet demands, we can dissolve the anger. The same is true for our ‘buttons’—once we understand them, we can defuse what happens when they’re pushed.”
