The show today is a flashback to one of the top viewed sessions in our 2020 Church Mental Health Summit with Joël Malm. He is sharing “how to keep anger and anxiety from ruining life’s relationships”. This is a fantastic talk that gives us a simple framework to help us evaluate our own anxiety and anger and through that insight, we are able to support others.
I choose this talk specifically for this time of year, December because when I experienced anger the holidays were full of triggers.
My hope for you is that as you listen to Joël’s session you hear what I eventually found for myself, that my anger was because I was weary. My anger was a response to what I was experiencing. It was a secondary response to the root issue.
I hope as you listen you too will find freedom and access Joël’s resources both for yourself and for those whom you’re supporting.
Podcast Links:
Joël’s Book: Love Slows Down
YouVersion Devotional – Calming Anger
YouVersion Devotional – Facing off with Anxiety and Fear
YouVersion Devotional – Love Slows Down
Quiz: Why am I angry?
There is a good chance that you have some regrets about your behaviour due to your anger.
- “Anger and anxiety don’t have to rule your life”
- Anger is always a secondary emotion, it’s a response to feeling a threat or hurt.
- “Anger isn’t a sin, it’s a sign.”
All Anger or Anxiety is a result of feeling a threat to our security, connection or control.
- Security= feeling of safety, financially, emotionally and physically
- Connection = relationships with others know we are valued and loved
- Control = free will, a sense of purpose and the ability to make our own decisions
When we look for security, connection and control in anything but God we will always feel anxiety and worry which will lead to anger
Anger is often identified as frustration.
- Take the test whyamiangry.info to discover where your angry most often stems from (security, connection or control)
- As a result of disobedience by Adam and Eve, fear/anxiety entered the world and then their children experienced Anger.
Anger identifies areas in our life that we need to surrender to God.
- If fear is driving anger, perfect drives out fear (1 John 4:18)
Anger leads to action
- When we get angry it causes us to shift our thinking away from rationality to the flight or fight mode
- Look for the secondary emotion behind the anger and seek love to slow down.
Questions to ask myself
- What is going on inside of me that is causing me to feel threatened?
- Am I feeling threatened in my security, connection or control?
CONNECT WITH JOËL
Book: Love Slows Down: How to Keep Anger and Anxiety from Ruining Life’s Relationships
Podcast: The Malm Podcast
CONNECT WITH HOPE MADE STRONG
Join the Church Mental Health Facebook Group! In the Facebook group, we chat about how to care for others, what are your challenges as well as share tons of resources. This is a great community of pastors, clinicians, and those with lived experience and we want to get to know you.