Let's take an example of what anger can do.

Say the car in front of you slows down and goes toward the curve, even though light is green. You are thinking "What is the driver is up to? The driver hasn't signaled to slow down or to turn. You beep your horn and start to move around him, but he hasn't pulled over enough to allow you to pass at the same time. The passenger door opens, and a woman steps out. She turns and leans on the car and continues to talk to the driver while the light turns red. You seem to get angrier and you lean on the horn harder. You then roll down your window and attempt to shout at him over the loud sound of your horn. You stop only when you spot a police officer down the block turning your way.

You finally make it to your job nearly half an hour late for a meeting. As you rush in and you throw your folders onto the secretary's desk nearly spilling her coffee. At the same time you shout at your secretary "Have those typed for me before lunch".

Anger is one of the basic human emotions when we feel threated. Our bodies automatically prepare to fight or flight in threatened situations. Our heart races, our mouth become dry, our pupils constrict, our breath becomes shorter, our speech becomes louder and our bodies tend to become tense. Anger tends to escalate and becomes contagious for a lot of people. If you become angry while speaking with someone, both of you may end up talking louder and louder and now you start developing a hostile posture.

Though anger is an instinctive reaction, the extent to which we express our anger depends on your attitude. If you are generally hostile in viewing the world, you are likely to perceive threats and feel like you need to defend yourself in situations where others would remain calm.

You may tend to leap to conclusions and misinterpret the intentions of others. You may feel that you are too easily taken advantage and much more likely to become angry. Irritability is a term for the emotional tone that's usually comes before your anger.

There are ways in which we can deal with our anger. You may repress anger and some therapists believe that once it is bottled up, anger comes to the surface in the form of depression. You may deal with anger passively for example, by refusing to talk or dragging your feet on an important project. You may place anger on obviously easier targets. For example, if your boss humiliates you, you may feel unable to respond to the situation and when you get home, you scream at your wife instead.

Even if you are not normally an angry person, you may be prone to becoming angry when you have too much to drink or taking drugs like cocaine and amphetamines. These can cause increased irritability and then your common sense diminishes and your irritability increases leading to anger.

Hate is a chronic form of anger. Hate itself is not actually a mental illness but in the medical field, professionals would probably agree that is not healthy.

How to cope with Anger

If you suffer from frequent bouts of anger, you may benefit from anger management. This is the type of psychotherapy where you can identify your tendency to perceive hostility on others when it really is not intended. Thereby, you can then decrease your anger response.

You can learn what triggers your anger so that you can avoid them or diffuse them first rather than just immediately react with anger.

You can learn relaxation techniques to decrease tension. This way you can gain confidence in your ability to remain in control of your feelings. You may still lose your temper from time to time, but you regain control faster.

Let's discuss parents with children. One thing a parent should not do is hit out of anger. Before you lift your hand to strike a child, first think "Why am I ready to hit him or her". This way you have given yourself a few seconds to calm down and take control. Are you hitting because someone just made you angry and your child just happens to make a remark that irritates you.

Hitting is not usually the answer. Punishment works much better. Take away what the child really likes and stick with your punishment. Don't give in because then your child will know you are not serious with punishments.

With the fast pace in life that we go through every day, especially when two parents are working, we really need just to sit down even if it's for 15 minutes, close your eyes and relax. Also, what is a great way to relieve tension in the home is to have a family meeting once a week because if anybody is feeling angry or something is bottled up inside, tension can be relieved because anger outcomes occur.