Dr. Deborah Cox, Psychologist

Empathy+Anger=Empathic Anger Empathic anger rises up in us when we see someone else being mistreated and we feel outrage on their behalf. We want to defend the person, protect them. Mirror neurons make us naturals at feeling the pain of others. I remember this most vividly from being the big sister to my three younger siblings. #anger #angerdissociation #angernumbing #Blackhistory #blacklivesmatter #compassion #dissociation #empathicanger #empathy #outrage #racism #trance

Mindful anger means experiencing the emotion in an: 1. awake, 2. deliberate, and 3. self-nurturing way. Let’s break this down a bit so we can see how to love ourselves through difficult moments. Last week, I had an experience that allowed me to practice this. The experience felt insulting and unprofessional. #anger #angerwisdom #AngerAdvantage #dissociation #grounding #meditation #mindfulanger #mindfulness #presence #selfnurturing

How does anger help with compassion? Yesterday I talked with a friend who grasped, for the first time, how a family member had emotionally abused her. In about five minutes, she went from confused and ashamed . . . to angry, as she pieced together an incident in which her brother had accused her of deception and then refused to hear her side of the story. #anger #angerandcompassion #angerwisdom #awareness #boundaries #compassion #emotionalawareness #integrity #selfacceptance #selfcompassion

Remember being angry as a child? Children's anger deserves our attention. When I talk to adults about their childhood anger, they usually remember, but feel anxious talking about it. Sometimes they draw a complete blank. I definitely remember being angry as a kid, and exploring my childhood anger yields clues about my adult relationships. #anger #angerwisdom #childmaltreatment #children #childrensanger #childrensemotion #dissociation #emotion #emotionalabuse #emotionalhealth #grounded #grounding #listening #parenting

Holding space for anger while bearing compassion for others is profoundly healing. #anger #angermyth #angerwisdom #emotionalscale #grudge #revenge #selfishanger #sinfulanger

Involving the Body with Anger Release In my last post, I introduced physical anger work as a tool for getting grounded. I gave instructions on how to deliberately release anger in a time-limited way using props, such as a punching bag or pile of cushions, a bat, and a 30-second timer. #anger #angerresearch #angerwork #dissociation #grounding #health #physicalangerexercise #physicalangerwork

When anger corrodes. Wait, does it? How can you tell when your anger morphs from a moment of clarity and self-protection to something else entirely? Anger has its destructive side . . . at least Ursula K. Le Guin believes it does. I reserve the right, at the end of this post, to disagree with her and talk about this "corrosive anger" in a different way.

Fear of Narcissism Yesterday, I talked with someone who is deathly afraid of her anger. She said, If I allow myself to express anger, I’m afraid I’ll be a narcissist. I worry about this, too. But our fear of narcissism comes from a fundamental misunderstanding. We confuse a simple trait, narcissism, with a mental disorder (narcissistic personality disorder). #anger #angerwisdom #development #emotionaldevelopment #fearofnarcissism #narcissism #narcissisticcontinuum