When we hear the words anger or “anger,” most of us imagine a 2- or 3-year-old boy lying on the ground, screaming and kicking. However, adults also have a tantrum. Sometimes emotions overflow and we can’t put Words on the frustration, envy, and disappointment we feel.
For behaviorism, the current of psychology that studies human behavior from stimuli and responses, tantrums are clearly inappropriate behaviors, they lead to nothing. However, the fact that they do not lead to anything concrete (or really useful) does not mean that these dynamics do not make sense behind them, on the contrary, these tantrums express a message rich in content.
“Follow your heart, but take your brain” – Alfred Adler-
Between the two and four years, tantrums are often part of a child’s emotional development, they are little more than this forced challenge that every parent must learn to handle calmly and effectively. an adult does not automatically give us the ability and maturity to recognize and control our emotions.
It might be safe to say that most of the adults around us have the emotional intelligence of a 3-year-old, if they did not develop a good sense of themselves in childhood, if they did not have adequate help in channeling and understanding their own identity. . emotional worlds generally continue to carry the same weight.
Anger attacks and tantrums are an oversized reaction to a frustrating situation, children, for example, tend to express anger by screaming, crying, kicking and with a clear lack of emotional control, there are different intensities, but what we always notice are disproportionate behaviors and lack of communication and management of emotions and impulses.
In adults (on average) these tantrums do not result in physical aggression, there are no kicks, kicks or bites, in addition, in many cases, they can even go unnoticed in their immediate environment.
Let’s take an example. Claudia works in a law firm and is used to success, every time you reach a goal she rewards you with a bonus, now when her peers get this recognition, Claudia can no longer accept it. floor, doesn’t scream, in fact, it doesn’t say anything.
Our protagonist goes to the bathroom to cry. Because she can’t stand the moment her peers overcome her, jealousy devours her and she doesn’t know how to deal with that discomfort, adults have a tantrum, but make no mistake, those emotional outbursts, if they’re authentic, don’t look to manipulate anyone, like children do.
Anger attacks are moments when feelings reach an intolerable intensity and need to emerge one way or another, it’s like being trapped in your own emotions and not knowing what to do with them.
Not everyone sells their tantrums in particular, as Claudia does, it is also common to find people who do not hesitate to shape a complete scene, there are screams, objects thrown on the ground and, worst of all, assaults with insults and disrespect. Now, what is behind these behaviors?
We said that at first. In many cases, tantrum is a demonstration of a clear emotional immaturity, a lack of meaning of the “I”. This allows for better handling of frustrations and disappointments. However, we cannot ignore other realities that any good professional should consider with an adequate diagnosis.
Let’s think for a moment about our lawyer Claudia, let’s put ourselves in your shoes and your difficulty asking for help, how can you say aloud that her emotions completely destabilize when her peers receive some kind of recognition and she doesn’t?Can we admit if, moreover, anger itself is shameful?She knows she shouldn’t feel that way, but she doesn’t know how to deal with it.
When you’re an adult, it’s very difficult to talk about the envy, frustration you create in certain situations. . . But can nothing be more positive than taking this step?and seek professional help. Every day we will feel freer, more capable and safer.
Now let’s think about a series of strategies that can help us in these cases, they are simple keys with which we can improve our control capacity, without feeding our behavior with this type of emotions.
In conclusion, we know that adults also have emotional crises, and we can have them ourselves from time to time, so if there is one thing we do know about them it is that they are not really pleasant, they create discomfort, they create very uncomfortable environments and we do not get anything out of it.
Therefore, it is time to work our emotions, to give them new opportunities and resources that make us feel more competent.