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Message: <blockquote data-quote="barsoomcore" data-source="post: 677441" data-attributes="member: 812">And I'm not suggesting you should.Well, and I've disagreed with that notion. My point being that the emotion is actually a response to the understanding of a life-threatening situation. You can choose a different response and still save your life. You'll probably have more luck, in fact.My experiences with life-threatening situations have been that I suddenly become calculating, dispassionate and quick-thinking. In danger my response is quick assessment and immediate action.Not emotion. Action. These are two different things, and it seems like both you and Wolv0rine feel that the first is REQUIRED for the second. It isn't for me.Why? Why put yourself to all that extra effort? Just don't be angry. Take the appropriate action, of course, but there's no need for anger.Given that your emotions rise out of subsonscious desires and fears, they seem to me to form poor compasses.Which is why paying attention is so important. More reliable than "This makes me angry so it must be bad."If it's a tool then surely you can choose whether or not to pick it up. The whole point of something being a "tool" is that it is under YOUR power. So with anger. Choose to feel it or not. If you think it will help you then go for it. Get angry. I've nothing against that. I don't find that it is helpful very often but knock yourself out. Just don't pretend you don't have a choice.I would say the key is noticing the danger in time and knowing how to avert it. Whether you're afraid or not.So what? What makes the "original target" so important? Because you made it so? Unmake it. That's easy enough.Now we're getting into the question of ego and how do we separate our ego from our ideas or desires.I think this Marine and Chet Baker would get along just fine. Chet doesn't care if the tune turns out the way he expected it to, as long as it's musically successfully he's happy. Likewise your Marine doesn't care if (say) the bridge doesn't look the way he thought it would, as long the trucks can get across the river, who cares?Don't knock yourself out because you didn't do what you thought you were going to do, is the point. Just get done what you NEED to do.Wol0rine: Forgive me for dropping out as our debate was nearing its peak. Or, possibly, becoming mired the old point-counterpoint of messageboard debate. A little break is a good thing, sometimes.I'm going to try and resum our disagreement, if I may, rather than carry on with the bit-by-bit arguing we were involved in earlier. I'll be stating my understanding of your position, so keep an eye out for where I'm not getting you!I said something along the lines of "Anger has only one cause and that is anger with ourselves. When we express anger towards others, we are in fact kidding ourselves since our real object of anger is ourselves."You disagree that anger has only one cause. While some instances of anger may conform to my model, you think that there are some that do not. We had some examples: the cranky grandma, the obnoxious driver and the MLE-type thinking. The idea is that in none of these examples is the anger in fact self-focused.Now I feel like I've refuted those three examples, and let me quickly run through my refutations again:Cranky Grandma: CG is making us angry with ourselves by playing on our helplessness in the family environment. We feel helpless to take action against her, and become angry with ourselves for being such helpless schmoes. Anger erupts within us, and rather than seek a solution we direct our anger at Grandma.Note that a solution can be sought and even found without any anger being required. If my Grandma is being rude or tedious (I find constant complaining and insults more tedious than anything else) then I can easily find a way of dealing with that without getting angry at her.Obnoxious Driver: OD makes us angry with ourselves by reminding us of, again, how helpless we are. We hate to be helpless. It's not too extreme to say that helplessness can cause panic in people -- panic which often emerges as anger.Again, anger is not required to solve the problem in question. If sudden maneuvering is needed to avoid the driver, I find that I take the actions first, and then begin to curse and holler at the driver. While I'm desperately steering out of the way, my mind is cold and logical. Once I'm safe again, my anger strikes.MLE: Of course this is a classic case of anger with oneself. The idea is that people feel an overwhelming need to defend their ideas out of a fear that they will be destroyed if they agree with someone else. This is a childish, egocentric worldview that treats all others as threats. It's based on fear. Fear of losing control. Anything that reminds us of how frightened we are makes us angry with ourselves for being such fraidy-cats. We don't want to admit to others that we feel this way, of course, and so we express anger towards them.So we see that in all three cases, what looks like anger with others is actually anger with ourselves.Huh? Huh?I also want to add my agreement with those who have put forward their satisfaction with the way this discussion is proceeding. I'm enjoying this immensely. ENWorld totally rocks.Dude, seriously.</blockquote>

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