Who does not know it: that tight feeling around the heart. The contraction in the stomach when we feel powerless.
In traffic, someone leans hard on the horn. Children are scolded. At work, anger erupts in a thunderstorm that blocks every constructive step forward.
We often hear:
“It is important to express your anger. Do not bottle it up.”
And yes—I know this path well. Pulling too firmly. The raised finger. Scolding when my older son has once again crossed my boundary or his younger brother’s.
Yet every expression of anger causes hurt. In the moment we act it out, we ourselves become the one who harms. At the same time, suppressing anger is just as toxic. It eats away at us from within and can even lead to disharmony in the body.
If neither expressing anger nor silently enduring it is the answer, where does the path lead?
In this article, I share insights from my own alchemical mastery of this emotion.
Healing begins before the next outburst
First, something very important: Healing can begin only where we look at our previous knee-jerk reactions.
Where the dark forces within us briefly took control and we expressed our anger. That is where we look first. Because shame continues to work. Unconsciously, it draws us into new situations in which we are invited to “work through” the same issue again and again (the law of cause and effect).
That is why it is vital to reprogram the cause.
The best path toward self-healing
For me, this process begins like this:
- First, the mind must fall silent. All the justifications. All the explanations of why this behavior was supposedly “necessary.”
- Then comes the honest admission: This action caused hurt.
And it is to precisely this part of myself that I now turn: the part that feels ugly, dark, unpleasant. The part I lived out through this expression of anger. The part I tried to explain away with inner justifications. The part of which I am ashamed.
- And then something decisive happens: I open my heart—to this very part.
I welcome it back into myself. I no longer split it off. I do not deny it. I do not look away. I recognize that it, too, is part of the whole that I am. And I feel love for this part.
That is forgiveness.
- Finally, I seal this process with gratitude. Gratitude that this part is there. Gratitude that it revealed itself. Gratitude that I could recognize it—and deepen my mastery of the heart through it.
And when anger arises now?
How do we deal with anger when it arises again? Or, more precisely: how do we meet the person whose behavior triggers this emotion in us? Because we know how easily we can get tangled in it. And who wants that?
The key remains the same, but an important clarification is needed here.
Anger does not arise outside us
Usually we say: “The other person makes me angry.” But that is only half the truth.
The anger is in me. As is every other emotion. The other person’s behavior may be a trigger—but not the cause. This is where responsibility begins, along with the possibility of moving from being a victim of circumstances to becoming the creator of our own reality.
What usually happens?
We project our anger onto the other person. We resist this emotion. We want to get rid of it.
And how do we try to do that?
By throwing something back at the other person that will stir the same emotion in them. Preferably with even more force. Louder. More dominating. So that they give in.
That is the familiar pattern.
And if we look at it soberly now, we can see very clearly where it leads:
Two egos escalating each other. An emotion that keeps intensifying. And an ever-deeper entanglement in the constriction of anger.
The only way out
To the place where we accept our anger. Where we face this emotion. Where we bear it without acting it out.
And—this is the decisive step—where we love ourselves with this emotion.
Because the moment we stop holding the outside world responsible for what is happening within us, we no longer need to give anything back. Nothing to express. Nothing to repay. Because we no longer need to get rid of the emotion.
When we have learned to accept our own shadow—what is ugly, shameful, and transgressive within us—with an open heart, we can also meet the other person’s shadow that has brought this anger to the surface in us.
In the moment a boundary is crossed.
In the moment of powerlessness.
In the moment of anger.
Certainly not by suppressing or diminishing the anger within us. Not by appearing composed while everything inside us boils. No,
Acceptance does not rule out boundaries
Some may now say:
“Benjamin, it is important to set boundaries.”
And yes—I completely agree. Boundaries are essential.
What I am describing does not rule them out. On the contrary: my experience is that we can set boundaries far more sustainably, and with a much wider range of possible actions, when we draw them with an open heart—without judging, without causing hurt ourselves.
Then boundaries no longer feel constricting, but spacious.
A personal example
I recently experienced a concrete example of this here on Substack. I had shared a short Note:
A thought that, like this article, grew out of my own practice.
It drew a very fierce comment. Full of resistance. Full of attack. Full of words that hurt. The person who was inwardly locked in a struggle with the role of perpetrator became, through their own expression, someone who caused harm. Violence is not only physical. It can also work through words.
A boundary as an act of self-love
And what did I do?
I reported the comment. Not out of defiance. Not out of revenge. But out of self-love. I do not want to be treated that way. Drawing this boundary was clear, calm, and necessary.
At the same time, those sharp, angry words stayed with me at first. They continued to resonate and kept my own frequency low for a while. Until something decisive happened.
The universe’s invitation
I realized:
Life had just lovingly invited me to live my own words once again—how beautiful! Another opportunity for mastery.
That recognition alone changed so much for me. I suddenly saw this person differently. Not reduced to their comment, to their shadow. I saw a whole being. With pain. With resistance. With an “ugly” part that wanted to be seen.
And I forgave them in love and gratitude. Gratitude for this encounter. Gratitude for the mirror. Gratitude for the opportunity to deepen my mastery of the heart.
Perhaps it was even an appointment we had made. And my heart was free again.
The essence
And we gain something far more valuable: room to act. Inner freedom. And an authority that does not come from hardness—but from clarity, gentleness, and inner freedom.
From my heart, I am glad you are reading my words. May they help you transform the situations mirrored in your life into lived mastery, with love and ease.
In connection,
Benjamin