Many people form opinions of anger management counseling from the media portrayal of anger management groups in movies and TV shows. These may be comedic or dramatic but rarely accurate. There are many myths of anger management.

Many beliefs of anger treatment stem from earlier practices based on assumptions and not on research based best practices.

Myth #1 You have to get all your anger out.

Nope. Not true. Turns out the old idea of people venting their anger, describing at length the situation or hitting pillows and screaming to get that energy out does not free you from the anger. In fact, it escalates the anger. These practices that began in the 1970s, such as couples hitting each other with foam bats during couple’s counseling stirred up aggression.

Anger is energy and when we release it through aggressive expression there is a temporary relief. But it is temporary. The next time a situation triggers angry feelings the habitual tool to manage your feelings is aggression. It is limiting. Put all those foam bats away. And question the credentials of anyone doing anger management with you using those bats!

The tendency to yell, scream or repeat over and over the events that “caused” the anger only re-stimulate the anger. How many times have you recounted an experience and felt the anger surge again? Ruminating or aggressively communicating does not “get the anger out,” even in a therapeutic environment. It keeps the anger spinning in your head, keeps a part of your brain fired up and perceiving danger.

The way to manage anger more effectively is to take a moment (preferably at least 20 minutes) to calm down. Let the hormones in the brain that were firing danger signals be re-absorbed. Do this by taking a walk, reading a magazine, anything that gets your focus off the angering situation. After 20 minutes then try to solve the situation.

Anger management counseling teaches techniques like these. Prevents re-experiencing your anger or communicating in any aggressive fashion. Getting it all out does not teach skills to look at your anger differently or act any differently. It often keeps you stuck in justifying your aggression and stuck in your anger.

Myth #2 Anger Management Group is a bunch of angry people sitting in a circle complaining and yelling about past experiences.

A poorly run group may look like that. But an anger management group run by a trained counselor should not. Having said that, there is a difference between anger management groups and anger management counseling groups. Anyone can run an anger management group. To facilitate a group all one must do is take a two-day course to learn some curriculum. They can open shop the next day. No additional training, credential, or state license is required to be a “certified” anger management trainer.

If you have any history of abuse, neglect, substance abuse, or other trauma in your life. I strongly suggest you find a licensed counselor-led anger management group. They have extensive training and experience. A facilitator who is not trauma-informed may inadvertently re-traumatize you. Which will keep you in an anger loop.

Anger management groups are meant to educate and allow you to practice new skills. Any group that spends the majority of time re-hashing old stories is not serving you. It may be keeping you stuck in your anger.

Myth #3 Anger Management Groups are supposed to help me get rid of my anger.

Anger is not a bad thing. It is good information, something happened and you feel violated. The goal of anger management is NOT to extinguish anger from your life. That would be terrible. There is lots of information and passion in your anger. It is energizing. Anger is why we take on causes. We are angered at an injustice whether it be civil rights or getting an inaccurate cable bill rectified. Anger is the energy behind the steps we take to rectify a situation.

The point is not to eliminate anger from your emotional repertoire. The point of anger management counseling is to teach new strategies for managing your anger triggers and channel that emotional energy into something more productive than you did previously.

Acknowledge your anger. Stuffing your anger does not work. Raging has other long-term consequences. The goal of anger management counseling is to enhance skills in the realms of thinking, relaxing and communicating – not extinguishing.