Cover photo by Alex Green from Pexels
Written by Katrina Hill of Brigham Young University
Part of being human is experiencing a full range of emotions- from elation to discouragement to frustration. Another part of the human experience is facing our own flaws and the flaws of others. Because no one is perfect and everyone has feelings, sometimes we clash and sometimes we get hurt. This can happen in marriages as well, because of how much time spouses spend together and how many joint decisions they make. Flare-ups occur, and conversations can sometimes take an angry turn. But is this always negative? What is the role of anger in marriage and can it be used constructively?
To address this question, it’s helpful to understand that anger’s biological purpose is to protect the wellbeing of the individual feeling it—not only physically, but also their emotional and psychological wellbeing. In order to fulfill that purpose, anger alerts the individual that something is wrong or not ideal in the relationship, and that it needs to be addressed and corrected (Butler et al., 2017).
Resisting the Urge to Attack
Anger is biologically a hostile emotion, so the natural response when we feel anger is to attack our partner, who has hurt or offended us in some way, in order to defend ourselves (Butler et al., 2017). This tendency can be problematic. Though there are several characteristics in couples that can be associated with divorce, well-respected marriage researcher, John Gottman identified one that is particularly damaging: contempt. Contempt is an angry response that shows hostility, disrespect, and meanness towards one’s partner (Lisitsa, 2018).
Gottman (1993) also clarified that couples expressing anger itself did not necessarily predict the end of the relationship—in other words, getting mad is not nearly as harmful as being mean. However, when we are angry, we often end up being mean too. Even so, as unnatural as it may feel, if we want our relationships to thrive, it is important to learn to express our anger without the hostility and attacking.
What’s the big deal about expressing anger the right way? Even if couples are never extremely mean and contemptuous, consistent patterns of expressing anger negatively still affect marital happiness. Responding to negativity with more negativity (e.g., sarcasm), makes it harder for either partner stop to respond and to repair hurt feelings. Increased physiological arousal during conflict, including higher blood pressure and adrenaline hormone levels, has also resulted in increased marital unhappiness (Gottman, 1998). This means that more conflict-derived, anger-caused physiological stress leads to unhappier marriages.
Anger in its raw, unchecked form can ravage like a wildfire and leave destruction in its wake. In contrast, anger in its constructive form is like a flame from a candle— it can illuminate our inner, more vulnerable feelings and light the way to healing, empathy, accountability, and change. It is still fire, but it is very different from the kind of fire that can burn down all that we hold dear. This concept of constructive anger has been described as “. . .authenticity with kindness. . .affirmative and assertive, yet remarkably softened” (Meloy-Miller et al., 2018, p. 44).
When our partner angers us, we can choose to see it as an opportunity to firmly yet kindly express how we feel about what they did and what we’d like to see change. If feelings are heard and changes made, the expression of anger actually helps couples grow closer and improve as individuals (Butler et al., 2017). On the other hand, if a serious offense has occurred and the hurt partner does not express their feelings or invite the offending partner to be accountable—the relationship can stagnate.
Expressing Anger Without Hostility
In order to express constructive anger, we have to choose honesty over hostility. However, it is easy to fall into the trap of using honesty as an excuse to be mean and put our partner down (Fremont-Smith, 2020). We can easily say that we are being honest when we are being mean to our partner. That’s how we feel, isn’t it, so why not say it like it is?
Identify Your Feelings
In reality, honesty requires us to take a moment to cool down and identify what is going on deeper inside us (Fremont-Smith, 2020; Meneses & Greenberg, 2012). Why is there anger arising, or in other words, what more sensitive feelings are we instinctively trying to protect? Is a part of us feeling hurt, let down, embarrassed, sad, scared, lonely, unworthy or disrespected? Remember, anger is biologically designed to protect us (Butler et al., 2017), so it often arises to cocoon something vulnerable, like an animal instinctively protecting her young. Though it may feel difficult, identifying and expressing those vulnerable feelings to our partner is a key step in expressing anger in a constructive way.
Specify What Made You Angry
We also have to be willing to let our partner know what they did to elicit the anger and other more vulnerable feelings. The goal of this step is to encourage accountability, not to blame, which leads to defensiveness (Meneses & Greenberg, 2012). It may be easier to lash out rather than to be open about our thoughts and feelings, but getting vicious in self-defense makes the situation worse (Gottman, 1998).
Work Together Towards Change
When we experience anger it often brings to light changes that need to be made in our relationship. Therefore, another key step is a request or invitation to our partner to change or to participate in discussing possible adjustments (Fremont-Smith, 2020). While compromise is the goal, sometimes our partner may not be willing to make changes, which can lead to major relational consequences depending on the seriousness of the issue (Butler et al., 2017). Even if this is the case, expressing constructive anger still helps us reduce rumination, stress, and desires to retaliate (Butler et al., 2017).
Affirming Our Partner’s Worth
When we express constructive anger, it may be helpful to include affirmations of both our own and our partners’ worth. This helps both partners remember that they did not deserve to be hurt, and that their partner who hurt/offended them is a person of value who does not deserve to be belittled (Butler et al., 2017; Meloy-Miller et al, 2018).
Summary
So, how do we express constructive, non-hostile anger and avoid contempt? In summary, here are the steps (Meloy-Miller et al, 2018):
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My feelings. Identify and state your vulnerable feelings (which can include anger itself)
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Your actions. State your partner’s actions that elicited those feelings
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Our change. Express what change you would like to see in the relationship and invite your partner to participate in helping make that change
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Our worth. Affirm the worth of both partners
For Example…
Let’s take two examples. Imagine for a moment that you walk in on a couple in the middle of a heated argument:
“Do you even know how a budget works, or is our situation just a joke to you? I have been trying so hard to follow it, and then you come in and blow all it all on who knows what!”
“Yeah, blame me, because I’m the one who got into all that debt before we met! You know what, now you know exactly how I felt when I found that out!”
Now let’s hear an exchange about the same issue, but with the first partner expressing his or her anger constructively, incorporating the four key elements listed above.
“Hey, honey, I noticed today that you’ve been spending way more money than we agreed on. I’m pretty disappointed that you disregarded our budget, and I’m scared that if you do this more, we’ll go into more debt. I’m grateful for you in so many ways and I’m glad we’re in this together, however, I don’t deserve and frankly can’t handle being put through this kind of stress. Can we talk about what happened and how we can keep it from happening again?”
“Oh, yeah, about that. . . I thought it would be worth it at the time, but then I regretted it. I’ve been struggling emotionally the last several days. . . I guess that’s just what I did to cope. I’ve been too embarrassed to say anything. . . I’m sorry.”
The partner expressing anger has not in any way shied away from the fact that something is wrong and needs to be fixed, but they have refrained from being mean. In fact, they were kind. And now, not only are the financial issues being addressed, but the other partner’s needs can also be addressed, whereas otherwise they might not have been (Meneses & Greenberg, 2012).
Though we may often want to make it clear to our partner that we are upset at them by making jabs at them, a more effective approach is to plainly yet gently tell them how we feel and ask for change. Love may be a battlefield, but whether couples fight alongside or against each other depends in part on how they understand and express anger in their partnership.
Start small by focusing on the first step of identifying your anger. This week, in a time when you feel angry, pause, and say out loud, “I am angry right now.” Try to identify two other emotions that you are also feeling (because anger is more of a secondary emotion, it is likely that you are experiencing other “softer” feelings such as sadness or fear simultaneously). Then, take ten deep breaths. Practicing labeling your feelings will make it easier to express them to your partner.
References
Butler, M. H., Meloy-Miller, K. C., Seedall, R. B., & Dicus, J. L. (2017). Anger can help: A transactional model and three pathways of the experience and expression of anger. Family Process, 57(3), 817–835. https://doi.org/10.1111/famp.12311
Fremont-Smith, K. (2020, September 15). How to change your own contempt. The Gottman Institute. https://www.gottman.com/blog/how-to-change-your-own-contempt/
Gottman, J. M. (1993). A theory of marital dissolution and stability. Journal of Family Psychology, 7(1), 57-75. https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/0893-3200.7.1.57
Gottman, J. M. (1998). Psychology and the study of marital processes. Annual Review of Psychology, 49(1), 169-197. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.49.1.169
Lisitsa, E. (2018, July 25). The Four Horsemen: Contempt. The Gottman Institute. https://www.gottman.com/blog/the-four-horsemen-contempt/
Meloy-Miller, K. C., Butler, M. H., Seedall, R. B., & Spencer, T. J. (2018). Anger can help: Clinical representation of three pathways of anger. The American Journal of Family Therapy, 46(1), 44–66. https://doi.org/10.1080/01926187.2018.1428130
Meneses, C. W., & Greenberg, L. S. (2012). Interpersonal forgiveness in emotion focused couples’ therapy: Relating process to outcome. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 40(1), 49–67 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-0606.2012.00330.x
