New research reveals that listing your grievances on a piece of paper, then throwing them away may make you less angry. So I gave it a try …
A lifetime enveloped in a benign, insulating cloud of oestrogen left me ill-prepared to be this nakedly, shockingly angry as it ebbs away in perimenopause. It is occasionally exhilarating, but mainly awful, being furious about so many things: the government, contradictory dental advice, inaction on climate breakdown, whatever cat keeps defecating at my back door. I exist at an exhausting, irrational rolling simmer that periodically comes to a head with me inappropriately venting, realising I’m being unreasonable, shamefacedly having a word with myself, then getting cross again.
Help may be at hand, however, according to research from Japan, which suggests that writing your grievances on paper then throwing it away may make you less angry. Study participants were deliberately angered by researchers criticising their work and adding gratuitous insulting comments. Participants then wrote down how they felt and either threw the paper away, shredded it or kept it. The ones who disposed of the paper “completely eliminated their anger”.
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