Never Get Angry Again

by David J. Lieberman

    2.  The impact of our choice carries forward. Once we commit to something, we use adaptive self-serving biases to support our decision. For example, after we buy a certain product, we’ll be more likely to notice evidence that confirms we made the right choice.

    3.  Nathaniel Branden, The Power of Self Esteem (Florida: HCI, 1992), 14–15.

  7. Reality Isn’t Going Anywhere

    1.  David J. Levitin, “Why the Modern World is Bad for Your Brain,” The Guardian (2015). https://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/jan/18/modern-world-bad-for-brain-daniel-j-levitin-organized-mind-information-overload

    2.  Adrita Arefin, “Teens and Tech: Preventing Technology Addiction,” FCD Educational Services Prevention Source e-journal (2013) http://myemail.constantcontact.com/E-Journal—Teens-and-Tech—Preventing-Technology-Addiction.html?soid=1101484057590&aid=tknlYJ025Ko

    3.  Cited by Stephen S. Ilardi, The Depression Cure: The 6-Step Program to Beat Depression without Drugs (Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press Lifelong, 2009), 6.

    4.  Michael Argyle, “Causes and Correlates of Happiness,” Well-Being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology, eds. Daniel Kahneman, Ed Diener, and Norbert Schwartz (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2000), 353–373.

    5.  Cited by Ilardi, The Depression Cure: The 6-Step Program to Beat Depression without Drugs, 71.

    6.  Annie Britton and Martin J. Shipley, “Bored to Death,” International Journal of Epidemiology 39, no. 2 (2010): 323–326.

    7.  We are painting with a broad brush and should note that depression is a complicated illness that can afflict a person through no fault or failure of their own.

    8.  Stress and anxiety foster neurosis and false beliefs. “If our brain is distracted or under pressure, we will tend to believe statements that we would normally find rather dubious … even if we were told they were untrue.” John A. Bargh, Mark Chen, and Lara Burrows, “Automaticity of Social Behavior: Direct Effects of Trait Construct and Stereotype Activation on Action,” Journal of Personality & Social Psychology 71, no. 2 (1996): 230–244.

    9.  Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality (New York: Harper, 1954), 46.

  8. The Meaning of Pleasure, the Pleasure of Meaning

    1.  Bruno Silvestrini, “Trazodone: From the Mental Pain to the ‘Dys-stress’ Hypothesis of Depression,” Clinical Neuropharmacology 12, suppl. 1 (1989): S4–10. PMID 2568177.

    2.  Psalms 119:92. See also “Happy is the man whom You afflict and teach him Your Bible” (Psalms 94:12).

    3.  “You have turned my grief into dance. You have loosened my sackcloth and girded me with joy. So that my soul might make music to You and not be stilled, my God, forever will I thank you” (Psalms 30:11–12).

    4.  Matthias J. Koepp, Roger N. Gunn, Andrew David Lawrence, et al., “Evidence for Striatal Dopamine Release during a Video Game,” Nature 393, no. 6682 (1998): 266–268.

    5.  Shawn Achor, The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work (New York: Crown Business, 2010), 78.

  PART III: MAKING SENSE OF PAIN AND SUFFERING

  9. Here Comes the Pain

    1.  “I can feel guilty about the past, apprehensive about the future, but only in the present can I act. The ability to be in the present moment is a major component of mental wellness” (Abraham Maslow).

    2.  Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning.

    3.  This means we have to look at our present life in the context of our multiple lives. Without exception, every recognized religion has a tradition of reincarnation. Indeed, it has even been embraced by hard science disciplines. Dr. Brian Leslie Weiss, a psychiatrist specializing in past life regression, brought many of these ideas to the forefront of modern psychology and psychiatry. In Hebrew, it is called gilgul ha’neshamos—literally, “the transmigration of souls through a succession of lives”—and it is mentioned in numerous places throughout the classical texts of Jewish mysticism, starting with the preeminent sourcebook of Kabbalah, the Zohar.

  10. Why Good Things Happen to Bad People

    1.  Carl Gustav Jung, “The Symbolic Life,” Collected Works, 18.

    2.  Maslow, Motivation and Personality, 46. Unbeknownst to many, in his later years Maslow amended his five-tier model to include a sixth tier, which places self-transcendence as a level higher than self-actualization. He writes, “The self only finds its actualization in giving itself to some higher goal outside oneself, in altruism and spirituality.” Maslow, A. H., “The Further Reaches of Human Nature,” Journal of Transpersonal Psychology (1969): 1–9.

  11. Staying Sane in an Insane World

    1.  Genesis 12:2.

    2.  While God offered such assurances, at no point did Abraham ever doubt God or hesitate in carrying out His will.

    3.  Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe, “Social readjustment rating scale,” Journal of Psychosomatic Research, vol. 11 (1967): 214.

  PART IV: MAKE PEACE WITH THE PAST, FOR GOOD

  12. Planes of Acceptance

    1.  Hamlet, Act I, Scene iii.

    2.  Arnold Beisser, “Paradoxical Theory of Change,” in Gestalt Therapy Now, eds. Joen Fagan and Irma Lee Shephard (Palo Alto: Science and Behavior Books, 1970), 77.

    3.  Proverbs 27:19.

  14. It’s Not Too Late to Have a Happy Childhood

    1.  As we have explained, those who lack self-esteem cannot easily give and receive love, but a qualification exists in the parent-child relationship because a parent’s innate yearning to connect and give to their child helps foster a genuine love. Alas, in time, the relationship too easily sours as the parent loses control over the child and is ill-equipped to deal with feelings of hurt, rejection, or disrespect.

    2.  Kathleen A. Lawler, Jarred W. Younger, Rachel L. Piferi, et al., “The Unique Effects of Forgiveness on Health: An Exploration of Pathways,” Journal of Behavioral Medicine 28. No. 2 (2005): 157.

    3.  Joseph LeDoux, “Emotion.” In Handbook of Physiology. 1: The Nervous System, F. Plum, ed. (Bethesda, MD: American Physiological Society, 1987).

    4.  Everett L. Worthington, Charlotte Van Oyen Witvliet, Pietro Pietrini, et al., “Forgiveness, Health, and Well-being: A Review of Evidence for Emotional Versus Decisional Forgiveness, Dispositional Forgiveness, and Reduced Unforgiveness,” Journal of Behavioral Medicine 30, no. 4 (2007): 291.

    5.  See Kathleen A. Lawler, Jarred W. Younger, Rachel L. Piferi, et al., “A Change of Heart: Cardiovascular Correlates of Forgiveness in Response to Interpersonal Conflict,” Journal of Behavioral Medicine 26, no. 5 (2003): 373–393.

    6.  A year after Benjamin Franklin’s death, his autobiography, entitled Mémoires de la Vie Privée, was published in Paris in March of 1791.

  15. My Apologies, Please

    1.  See Gerhart Piers and Milton B. Singer, Shame and Guilt: A Psychoanalytic and Cultural Study (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1971).

    2.  Mark R. Leary, Eleanor B. Tate, Ashley Batts Allen, et al., “Self-Compassion and Reactions to Unpleasant Self-Relevant Events: The Implications of Treating Oneself Kindly,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 92, no. 5 (2007): 887–904.

    3.  Paul Gilbert, The Compassionate Mind: A New Approach to the Challenges of Life (London: Constable and Robinson, 2009).

    4.  Paul Gilbert, et al., “Having a Word with Yourself: Neural Correlates of Self-Criticism and Self-Reassurance,” Neuroimage 49, no. 2 (2010): 1849–1856.

    5.  Eva Jonas, Jeff Schimel, Jeff Greenberg, et al., “The Scrooge Effect: Evidence that Mortality Salience Increases Prosocial Attitudes and Behavior,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 28, no. 10 (2002): 1342–1353.

  PART V: HOW TO LOVE
BEING ALIVE

  16. A Date with Destiny

    1.  See Naomi Mandel and Steven J. Heine, “Terror Management and Marketing: He Who Dies with the Most Toys Wins,” Advances in Consumer Research 26 (1999): 527–532.

  17. Becoming Extraordinary

    1.  Karen Horney, Our Inner Conflicts: A Constructive Theory of Neurosis (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1945), 155.

    2.  Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney, Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength (New York: Penguin Press, 2011), 67.

  18. Escaping the Trap of Perfection

    1.  Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has been used to show that the amygdala is stimulated when we make decisions couched in uncertainty. See Benedetto De Martino et al., “Frames, Biases, and Rational Decision-Making in the Human Brain,” Science 313 (2006): 684–687.

  PART VI: RECLAIMING OURSELVES AND REDEFINING OUR BOUNDARIES

  21. Speak Now, or Forever Be in Pieces

    1.  Dana R. Carney, Amy J.C. Cuddy, and Andy J. Yap, “Review and Summary of Research on the Embodied Effects of Expansive (vs. Contractive) Nonverbal Displays,” Psychological Science 26, no. 5 (May 2015): 657–663.

    2.  Pablo Brinol, Richard E. Petty, and Benjamin Wagner, “Body posture effects on self-evaluation: A self-validation approach” European Journal of Social Psychology 39 (2009): 1053–1064.

    3.  Hal R. Arkes, Lisa T. Herren, and Alice M. Isen, “The Role of Potential Loss in the Influence of Affect on Risk-Taking Behavior,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 42, no. 2 (1988): 181–193.

    4.  See Alyssa Nguyen, Forgiveness: What’s Mood Got to Do with It? Thesis in Psychology, Humboldt State University, 2008.

    5.  Sybil Carrère and John Mordechai Gottman, “Predicting Divorce among Newlyweds from the First Three Minutes of a Marital Conflict Discussion,” Family Process 38, no. 3 (1999): 293–301.

  22. Successful Relationships with Impossible People

    1.  Douglas W. Nangle, Cynthia A. Erdley, Karen R. Zeff, et al., “Opposites Do Not Attract: Social Status and Behavioral-style Concordances and Discordances Among Children and the Peers Who Like or Dislike Them,” Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 32, no. 4 (2004): 425–435.

    2.  Daniel Goleman, Working With Emotional Intelligence (New York: Bantam Books, 2000).

  PART VII: ADVANCED PSYCHOLOGICAL STRATEGIES TO LIVE ANGER FREE

  23. The Power of Neuroplasticity

    1.  Brad J. Bushman, “Does Venting Anger Feed or Extinguish the Flame? Catharsis, Rumination, Distraction, Anger, and Aggressive Responding,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 28, no. 6 (2001): 724–731, as explained by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson, Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts (Boston: Mariner Books, 2015), 33.

    2.  See Shahbaz Khan Mallick and Boyd R. McCandless, “A Study of Catharsis of Aggression,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 4, no. 6 (1966): 591–596.

    3.  Melinda Wenner, “Smile! It Could Make You Happier,” Scientific American Mind (September/October 2009): 14–15.

    4.  Maiai Szalavitz, “Sweet Solace: 10 Mostly Pleasant Truths about Pain,” Psychology Today (September/October 2005): 74–80.

    5.  While the unconscious mind stores every thought, sensation, and experience, the brain is no longer able to readily access those stored memories.

    6.  Craig H. Bailey and M. Chen, “Morphological Basis for Long-Term Habituation and Sensitization in Aplysia,” Science 220, no. 4592 (1983): 91–93.

    7.  Antonio Pascual-Leone and Fernando Torres, “Plasticity of the Sensorimotor Cortex Representations of the Reading Finger in Braille Readers,” Brain 116, no. 1 (1993): 39–52.

    8.  Proverbs 15:1.

  24. Change Your Self-Concept, Change Your Life

    1.  Jonathan L. Freedman and Scott C. Fraser, “Compliance without Pressure: The Foot-in-the-Door Technique,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42, no. 2 (1966): 195–202.

    2.  Research conducted with athletes, including Olympians and professionals, relates that they can actually feel the muscle twinges associated with their actions as they envision themselves executing a variety of tasks. Terry Orlick and John Partington, Psyched: Inner Views of Winning (Canada: Coaching Association of Canada, 1986).

    3.  Guang Yue and Kelly J. Cole, “Strength Increases from the Motor Program: Comparison of Training with Maximal Voluntary and Imagined Muscle Contractions,” Journal of Neurophysiology 67, no. 5 (1992): 1114–1123.

    4.  Roger M. Enoka, “Neural Adaptations with Chronic Physical Activity,” Journal of Biomechanics 30, no. 5 (1997): 447–455.

    5.  Daniel Akst, We Have Met the Enemy: Self-Control in an Age of Excess (New York: Penguin Press, 2011), 14.

    6.  Karen Horney, Our Inner Conflicts: A Constructive Theory of Neurosis (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1995), 75–76.

    7.  Mark Muraven and Elisaveta Slessareva, “Mechanisms of Self-Control Failure: Motivation and Limited Resources,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 29, no. 7 (2003): 894–906.

    8.  Brandon J. Schmeichel and Kathleen Vohs, “Self-Affirmation and Self-Control: Affirming Core Values Counteracts Ego Depletion,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 96, no. 4 (2009): 770–782.

  25. Taking Advantage of the Mind/Body Connection

    1.  Matthew T. Gailliot, Roy F. Baumeister, C. Nathan DeWall, et al., “Self-Control Relies on Glucose as a Limited Energy Source: Willpower Is More Than a Metaphor,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 92, no. 2 (2007): 325–336.

    2.  Sang Hyuk Lee, Seung Chan Ahn, Yu Jin Lee, et al., “Effectiveness of a Meditation-Based Stress Management Program as an Adjunct to Pharmacotherapy in Patients with Anxiety Disorder,” Journal of Psychosomatic Research 62, no. 2 (2007): 189–195.

    3.  Herbert Benson and Miriam Z. Klipper, The Relaxation Response (New York: HarperTorch, 2005), 78–91.

    4.  Herbert Benson, “The Relaxation Response: Therapeutic Effect,” Science 278, no. 5344 (1997): 1694–1695.

    5.  Stuart Appelle and Lawrence E. Oswald, “Simple Reaction Time as a Function of Alertness and Prior Mental Activity,” Perceptual & Motor Skills 38, no. 3 (1974): 1263–1268. Jagdish K. Dua and Michelle L. Swinden, “Effectiveness of Negative-Thought Reduction, Meditation and Placebo Training Treatment in Reducing Anger,” Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 33, no. 2 (1992): 135–146.

    6.  Matthew T. Gailliot and Roy F. Baumeister, “The Physiology of Willpower: Linking Blood Glucose to Self-Control,” Personality and Social Psychology Review (2007): 303.

    7.  Matthew T. Gailliot, et al., “Self-Control Relies on Glucose as a Limited Energy Source: Willpower Is More Than a Metaphor,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 92, no. 2 (2007): 325–336.

    8.  Gretchen Reynolds, “Phys Ed: Can Exercise Moderate Anger?” The New York Times, August 11, 2010.

    9.  Andrew Smyth, Martin O’Donnell, Pablo Lamelas, Koon Teo, Sumathy Rangarajan, Salim Yusuf and on behalf of the INTERHEART Investigators, “Physical Activity and Anger or Emotional Upset as Triggers of Acute Myocardial Infarction,” Circulation 134, no.15 (2016).

  26. Getting Real with Meditation and Visualization

    1.  Özlem Ayduk and Ethan Kross, “From a Distance: Implications of Spontaneous Self-Distancing for Adaptive Self-Reflection,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 98, no. 5 (2010): 809–829. http://selfcontrol.psych.lsa.umich.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/SD.pdf

    2.  Guy Winch, “A Simple Mind Trick that Reduces Emotional Pain,” Psychology Today September 2013.

    3.  John Griffiths, Gillian Fortune, Vicki Barber, et al.
, “The Prevalence of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Survivors of ICU Treatment: A Systematic Review,” Intensive Care Medicine 33, no. 9 (2007): 1506–1518. DOI: 10.1007/s00134-007-0730-z.

  27. In the Heat of the Moment

    1.  Self-directed neuroplasticity is a concept derived from the researcher Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz in his book The Mind & The Brain: Neuroplasticity and the Power of Mental Force (New York: Harper Perennial, 2003).

    2.  Brandon J. Schmeichel and Kathleen Vohs, “Self-Affirmation and Self-Control: Affirming Core Values Counteracts Ego Depletion,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 96, no. 4 (2009): 770–782.

    3.  Edward Burkley, “The Role of Self-Control in Resistance to Persuasion,” Peronality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34, no. 3 (2008): 419–431.