Help to Heal a Hurting Marriage by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Moody Publishers
Published: 2018-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Anger repressed can poison a relationship as surely as the cruelest words.

DR. JOYCE BROTHERS

EXPLOSIONS AND IMPLOSIONS

THE FLAME SHOT upward, fueled by a break in a city gas line. The line had ruptured when a private contractor, clearing land, clipped a gas pipe. At first just the pressurized gas poured out, hissing loudly. But within thirty minutes, a random spark had ignited the natural gas, which flamed skyward.

Within minutes the fiery plume was almost five stories high, and only a few yards away from Chicago public housing that lodged senior citizens. Fortunately, police and others evacuated the residents from the building. But when the gas company finally stopped the fuel feeding the line, scores of people had been displaced, their housing gutted or scorched.

Two months later, another explosion would displace Chicago residents. This time, though, the explosion was planned. A series of dynamite charges rigged by a demolition company popped in succession, and, one by one, four adjoining buildings at a different public housing project fell, crumbling to the ground and raising huge clouds of dust.

But this “explosion” was actually an implosion, with building materials falling inward; the destruction had been planned for months, as part of an ongoing project to replace crime-infested, rundown housing with new, low-rise developments. In fact, former residents and other spectators watched a safe distance away, some applauding.

Which do you think was the more destructive event? Was it the gas-line explosion that charred the side of a building and left people without homes? Many would say yes. But in truth, both the gas explosion and the building implosion had equally destructive consequences. The imploding of the housing project destroyed more buildings and left many residents feeling a sense of loss for the home they had known for years. Likewise, implosive anger can be as damaging as explosive expressions of anger.

We have looked at constructive ways of responding to anger in the last three chapters, but let’s be honest: Many of us have never learned to handle anger positively. We see that our responses to anger in the past have always made things worse. We find it hard even to believe that anger itself is not evil. We see the angry behavior of children, teenagers, and adults flashed before the world each day online and on TV, the crime and war and suffering that anger leaves in its path of destruction.

How then can we recognize—and control—harmful expressions of anger?

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