Anger Journaling

One effective way to become aware of your anger triggers is to keep a daily anger log. At the end of each day, write down the answers to the following questions:

• Did I feel angry today?
• What was the situation, and who was there?
• What thoughts were going through my mind when the situation occurred?
• How intense was my anger, on a scale of 1 - 10 (1 being very low, and 10 being very high)
• What could I have done differently?
• How did my response affect me and the people around me?
• Did my response lead to resentment and damaged relationships?
• Did I apply problem-solving and communicate in a non-hurtful way?
• If my response was destructive, what would help me to manage my anger better in the future?

Then, at the end of each week, take a look at the logs you kept each day and look for common threads -- what were your most frequent anger triggers? What skills did you use? Were these skills effective? Can you identify any specific areas of improvement over last week?

Writing down your thoughts in this way will help you to clarify where you seem to run into trouble in terms of your anger. Once you are aware of where your trouble spots are, you are better equipped to change your reponse to anger.