What makes you angry? It’s an innocent enough question. But did you know that by answering it you could be revealing more than you realise?

According to Carl Jung, knowing what makes you angry reveals important things about your personality and bottled up issues. He said:

“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.”

There is more than a close association between anger and love. In fact, anger is our reaction to what is threatening the thing we love or care about the most.

Anger is an incredibly powerful emotion. It is an indication that something is wrong. Basically, it’s a kind of tell. It can reveal our subconscious thoughts.

It’s an outward sign of inner tension. Anger is a release of bottled up emotion. It means that a person can no longer hold onto their feelings and they burst out in a number of ways. Everyone gets angry, it’s just that some show it more than others.

It is what makes you angry that is so interesting. The majority of us get angry at the usual suspects, you know, the huge scale of injustices around the world.

The senseless killing of civilians in wars we don’t understand. Children starving when we are throwing away perfectly good food. The torture of animals for profit.

Everyone gets angry about these types of things. So what sort of things are we talking about?

1. What makes you angry? – BEING BLAMED FOR SOMETHING YOU DIDN’T DO

What it reveals about you – Your self-esteem relies on the opinion of others

Who in their right mind wants to be blamed for something they didn’t do? But if this makes you angry, then it’s likely that your self-esteem relies on validation from others. You need people to see you in the best possible light. Anything that casts a shadow on that light hurts you personally.

There are other reasons why it upsets you. You feel very strongly about fairness and justice. You are the type of person that champions the underdog.

You’ll root for those less fortunate and always look at both sides of an argument before making a decision. You have an innate sense of right and wrong and stick up for those who can’t.

2. What makes you angry – LIARS

What it reveals about you – You associate your identity with honesty and truth

No one likes a liar, but what does it say about you if lying makes you angry? Lying is a violation of trust. It attacks the very core of our being. It affects us on a deep and unconscious level.

Those who lie to us betray us. When they lie, they take aim at our very identity. We start to distrust our own instincts. We need to connect with people for the sake of our self-image. It is other people’s reactions that make up our identity.

If those people lie to us, it affects our very construct.

Trustworthy people are more likely to get angry if they are lied to. They are loyal, dutiful, and take their responsibilities very seriously.

3. What makes you angry – BAD DRIVERS

What it says about you – You place great importance on social etiquette

Road rage. A 21st-century problem that is on the rise. But what does it reveal about you if you constantly get angry whilst driving? The artificial shell of our cars protects us when we drive.

Yet, when we drive, we still expect to experience the social niceties we take for granted in everyday life.

For example, if you are walking along the street and you accidentally bump into someone, you immediately apologise. Both of you accept the apology and you happily go on your way.

Encased in our cars, we are impersonal, safe and the pace is much faster. The problem is when we drive any mistakes are amplified and our reactions are instantaneous.

If this rings a bell, then it probably annoys you when you stop at a crossing to allow someone to walk across it and they don’t thank you.

4. What makes you angry – PEOPLE TAKING CREDIT FOR YOUR WORK

What it says about you – Your work is who you are

Now, this is something that would make me angry, so what does it say about me? My work is important to my identity. It is who I am and what I do.

If someone stole it and passed it off as theirs, I would be furious. To think that after all the effort I have put in that someone else can just come along and pinch it and get the credit is unthinkable to me.

Others might not be that bothered. But I link my work to my persona. Steal my work and you’ve kidnapped my child and then sold off as someone else’s.

Of all the things in my life, my work is one of the most important and one of the things I love the most. Those who get angry when people take credit for their work generally associate their personality with what work they do.

Their work is who they are. They place great importance on job titles for their own self-confidence, but not to impress others.

5. What makes you angry – QUEUE-JUMPERS

What it says about you – You won’t let people take advantage of you

Certain nationalities put great importance on queue etiquette. Furthermore, break that etiquette and in the UK at least, you’ll get a stern frown, or worse, loud tutting in your direction.

But for some, queue jumping brings out a sense of moral outrage. When someone pinches your place, they take advantage of you. That queue jumper has ignored the rules that the rest of us have signed up to.

You are in a situation not of your own making. You have to decide – stand up for your rights or remain quiet. But is it worth sticking your neck out and making a big deal over a place in a queue?

People that do speak out feel very strongly about others taking advantage of them. They are also likely to champion causes where they see similar injustices.

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves

Obviously, there are many other things that make us angry. I know I’ve just skimmed the surface. If you know what makes you angry and you’d like to share it, we’d love to hear about it.

References:

  1. https://www.huffingtonpost.com
  2. https://www.psychologytoday.com

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This Post Has 2 Comments

  1. SS

    Very well defined however many allow anger to seep into daily lives in families.to clarify this what about those who get angry and just keep on continuing become so obsessive that a small incident that led to anger takes mammoth proportions that the truth is so far from the original issue and changes it to something hundred times worse.this kind of anger is corrosive to the individual as well as those around such a person.

  2. teri

    Seriously?? Annoyed, yes. But angry? Hardly.

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