Anger: Responding, Not Reacting

Anger is natural, intelligent and necessary for surviving and flourishing. Yet when we are hooked by anger, it causes great personal and collective suffering. This talk explores how to transform patterns of reactivity by bringing a mindful and compassionate attention to the unmet needs that underlie angry reactivity. When we learn how to pause and connect honestly with our inner experience, we are then able to respond to others from our full intelligence and heart.

“Getting angry with another person is like throwing hot coals with bare hands: both people get burned.” Buddha

Reviews

Wonderful, thank you

Thank you for this beautiful talk and meditation . It really helped me manage my emotions now that I am going a through a deep ranger situation with my best friend. It is always better to learn to respond even if it means to get in touch with deep and old pain . This is not only helpful but meaningful and deep healing.
Ya Thank you so much Tara

Thank you.

Terrific insights into working with our anger. Helped me understand the emotional intelligence of anger and how to dance with such a heated emotion.

What a wonderful personalized journey walking with anger.

This talk gave me a deep peace and sense of understanding myself and others. Thank you 🙏🏼 “Vengeance is a lazy person’s grief,” that one will stick! I’m uncovering my deep needs with less resistance after hearing your voice and stories. Again, I thank you and God bless you!!

Learned a great deal about myself and others during my triggering/patterns of responding to anger. Thank you.

Such an amazing intelligent Talk. Everyone should listen.

Exactly what I needed In a repeated anger pattern with my partner. Thank you so much, Tara.

She’s one of my favorite teachers

Very clear messages and extremely calm communication skills

i first listened to this three years ago. i can add one more area of question. when you discover something your partner did but you don’t learn about it until after they die. but this talk still helped me in that situation especially when you said, be the one who is gracious 🩵💙 namaste 🙏

Beautiful talk about anger, thank you Tara.

Not the first time I listen to this talk, but I keep forgetting to pause and to offer kindness inwards. Such a helpful reminder and I can honestly say that Tara Brach has changed my life. I am forever grateful.

Thank you 🙏🏼 made a difference for me today

Thank you so much for sharing this wisdom! It really resonated. I hope to take this into my relationship. Thank you again.

Very wise and soothing. Thank you!

Insightful and useful. Namaste 🙏

Extremely helpful 🙏

Tara Brach has a way of explaining things so that they really make sense on a personal level.

What a wonderful, talk. Thanks

Very insightful. Thank you!

Incredible

Wonderful! 🫶🏽

Awesome. Thanks.

This was incredible. I loved the talk & could relate to the examples. I appreciate your guidance! 💛🙏🏻💜

Love her! So great, helpful, profound… and funny!

What a beautiful wise woman. Word's that I will always remember, notes that I will always have.
Thankyou Tara.
Most kind regards Tracy Gillan.
God bless you twice 🙏🐦🙏

So powerful! I couldn’t have found this at a better time. This talk single-handedly changed my relationship to the reactivity I have been battling within myself. I am so grateful for her wisdom.

Amazing

Excellent —insightful.

What an intelligent, compassionate, and deeply understanding way to engage with anger. I feel empowered by this technique.

Just listened to this talk after having a heated conversation with my partner. I wanted to know why I reacted with frustration and disappointment to her. She also explained she was angry with me and didn't want to talk. This presentation talk has helped me greatly in gain a better understanding of where my frustration was coming from, fear, lack of comprehension, tiredness, resentment. Thank you for taking the time to share this talk.

This talk really made a whole lot of sense to me. I had a situation where I was put on a psychiatric medication that made me extremely angry and other negative things that was totally the opposite of my normal demeanor. I got into it with a good friend and cussed him out. Now he will not speak to me or even be in my presence. I really regret my behavior and not apologizing right away, but I need time to process the situation and to learn from my mistakes and experiences. My doctor took me off that medication and I am slowly but surely returning back to my normal self. I want to reconcile and reconnect with that friend, but feel that their emotional intelligence is not at the level of being able to handle or accept forgiving a person who has wronged them. Truth be told, but I don’t really know if I care to reconcile with that person anyway. Your whole talk in anger really pointed out how much I really didn’t want to feel the emotion. I loved the metaphorical references and the verse at the end of the talk really cemented all that you had went over. Please do continue making more content on this topic. I’m grateful for the insight and your knowledge of how relationships work.

🙏🏽

Her perspective, wisdom and humor always bring me to a better understanding of myself and experience.

Not only a wonderfully clear description of what anger is, but also an understandable pathway from which to navigate it. I'll be listing to this again and again.

That was powerful!

Loved the lessons

Tara has incredible wisdom and the skill to easily communicate and share it with others.

This talk is my go-to when I’m stuck in anger and forget the need to turn inward. With this talk, Tara has helped me understand my need(s) and has given me the tools to communicate my needs in a way others can hear them. Thank you, Tara.

Amazing

Thank you. I struggle with anger and you helped me understand it in a way I never did before. I will teach myself to pause!

Good advice with such a calm demeanour

Rich in wisdom, wonderful stories to illustrate our shared humanity. Moving and poignant quotes embedded throughout.

So healing, so helpful, thank you…🙏🏼💜

Thank you

Touching the rawness of feelings of anger….seeing it from a new perspective is healing.

Loved this ❤️❤️❤️🙏🏽

So very helpful, thank you 🙏 I have spent a lot of time in a mens group where the primary teaching is to act out & release our anger in private, and then look at the hurt underneath. I’ve been told the “acting out” anger puts my nervous system under a lot of stress.
This talk sheds light on a different more healthy way to process strong emotions through acceptance and loving kindness towards myself and the other 🙏

Very good thoughts on how to feel with being angry. I would like further help on expressing anger in a positive way which can open a discussion on how we can work better.
Thank you!Namaste

Another beautiful lesson from Tara! I could listen to Tara all day.

Great information on anger, how to manage it through the pause and learning to respond instead of react!

Amazing talk, so glad I found this. Really helpful and informative.

Superb!

I’ve listened twice and may need to listen a third time. It is deep and the work is hard but it is something I need to do.

Amazing. Thank you!!

Pure bliss 💕

Wow. Just excellent.

Beautiful and Heart Healing. I learned a lot about my anger triggers and how to respond in a more wise way. It is explained so clearly in this talk here. Thank you Tara Brach, for your compassionate wisdom.

Amazing

Tara, I love you

This was so healing. My heart was so heavy. Thanks for showing a way. ❤️

Exactly what i needed!

Needed that. Thank you!

Wish she had gone more into examples of dealing with someone who doesn’t display reciprocity of consideration and/or dealing with someone who doesn’t respect your boundaries but whom you can’t end a relationship with. Otherwise really helpful and insightful talk!

Very timely for me. Thank you 🙏🏼

Thank you 🙏🏽❤️

Finding the feelings under the anger can be a challenge. Thank you for sharing your light 🌟 🙏

Loved it!

Tara - your wisdom is a true gift. Grateful for your dedication to mindfulness teachings 🕉️🧘🏻‍♀️💜

Just what I needed, as always. Thanks, Tara, for your kind gently heart, your never ending wisdom and your soft wit. It is all needed as it all belongs. I’m so grateful!

Fantastic

This talk was incredibly helpful to me. The notion that anger is a need not being met prove to be a moment of clarity to me. That idea opened a pathway for exploration that I’ve never considered and I believe will prove a great step forward and dealing with anger and improving communication with others. I highly encourage anyone dealing with anger issues to give this a listen. When I first saw that it was 53 minutes long I thought I don’t really have time for this, but I’ll give it a try. Before I knew it, I had listened to the entire talk, which flew by, and upon reflection I’m so glad I decided to take the time. It not only change the mood I had been in, but gave me a tool to use for the future. I don’t usually leave feedback, but I felt this was very helpful and instructive and well worth the time to give it a review so that maybe it can help others as it helped me. Highly recommended.

Thank you. I have been struggling with my anxiety and depression and anger. My wife and I are both struggling. Thank you for your wisdom.

Really great

I am grateful to hear this talk by Tara. It is helping me understand there is a way out of anger and to heal my hurts, while also seeing the hurts of the other with whom I am angry. This way there is a gateway to turn the tide of anger while it is happening and to even help me heal my own hurts felt in angry experiences in my past.
I found the meditation allowed me to feel self compassion related to a significant anger event. I can practice this pause and “turn around” when I am angry. That makes me anticipate less fear when I need to express myself during a situation where anger maybe rise between us.

Very insightful. Thank you! Highly recommend this!

Beautiful talk

Must listen! So good!

Very insightful. I appreciate the helpful tools to explore anger. Thank you

Bery helpful fire extinguisher.

I needed this so much. Thank you x

Thanks for the insights

☺️👍🏼

Thank you for sharing this gift. Thank you for contextualising anger and the gift to our lives.

LOVE, LOVE , this!!

Very gentle and healing deep insight toward anger.

Thank you. This is so helpful.

Thank you for the useful words about anger. Peace be with you.

Always find a new way of understanding things when I listen to Tara's talks.

I have recently had to move in with my mother in law due to end stage dementia. There have been major issues in the past with my sister in law, and my in laws blamed us. My husband and I withdrew from the family to find peace. Being back in the situation has ignited my sister in law attacks and i have found I’m constantly angry. My mother in law can’t own any of it anymore due to the illness. I have been trying to work on and control the anger and this teaching has helped so much!!!! Thank you so much!

My husband and I just had an argument and I walked away to try to think about what happened. I went to our room and put your wonderful talk on speaker to listen. He came into the room and laid down and listened to it too. Your ideas are so helpful and I immediately felt calm knowing what to work on. Thank you very much for this wonderful process you haven spoken about. I am certain this will help me to learn how to better communicate. Thank you so very much!

Wonderful talk.

Interesting

thank you

Tara strikes again

Loved it

Exactly what I needed to hear today, and every day frankly! Thank you so much!

A great talk with some insightful things to consider. I love that you mention anger is an unmet need. Really makes me think inward as to what I am really feeling.