EP 445: Should You Argue When You’re Angry? With Megan

This is episode number 445. Should You Argue When You’re Angry with Megan? Welcome to Over It and on with it. I’m your host Christine Hassler and for over a decade I’ve been a life coach, speaker and author. Each week you’ll hear me work directly with a caller as I coach them through a goal they wanna accomplish or an obstacle they may be facing.

I’ll provide a blend of practical and spiritual advice, as well as tangible actions you can apply to your own life. Now let’s get on with the episode. Hey everybody, welcome back to the show. This is a great topic today. One I haven’t addressed specifically about how to consciously argue. Can you have a conscious conversation when two people are angry, whether it’s romantic relationship or friendship or business or family relationship,

whatever it is, what do you do when there’s anger present? So that’s what we’re gonna dive into. You might hear some birds tripping in the background because I am sitting with my window open because it’s actually a nice day in Austin, which I like to take advantage of because come summer we are prisoners in our air conditioning homes, which is why Steph and I are intentional about leaving,

especially for the months of July and August and where we most likely are going to be this July and August is in Canada, Vancouver, Canada, just gotta give my daughter a passport. But that is where we are likely to be, July and August. So if you are in Canada, especially the West coast, and you would like us to do an event there,

we could do like a combination breath work, one day workshop type thing, like a reset day. Let me know if you’re interested and if you are someone that has access to a venue or has some venue suggestions. ’cause I’ve only been to Vancouver once to speak and I was there like 24 hours. So if you have any suggestions, hit me up because if we get enough interest then we’ll host an event and maybe more than one.

We’ll see. But I’ve never hosted an event in Canada and I have a feeling that some Ofia Canadians might be interested and I’d love, I love, love, love meeting my listeners in person. It’s so fun for me and so exciting because you hear me know who I am, but I dunno who you’re, and so I love that. So message me on Instagram.

Christine Hassler, if you would be interested in event and or if you know of any great event spaces to hold a one day event, which would be super, super fun. And if, again, if we get enough interest and people are really excited, maybe we’d even do a two day type of thing. We’re just gonna see what y’all tell us and what y’all are really craving and we’ll adjust to what the feedback that we get,

which is how I love to create things. Co-create things. Always think especially for transformational events and retreat type experiences, it’s always a co-creation with the people that have a divine appointment to be there. All right, as you’re listening to this episode, consider, do you put a lot of pressure on yourself to be conscious when you’re in an argument? Is anger a trigger for you?

When someone gets angry, what’s your response? Do you go into more of a trauma response? Do you fight, flight or freeze? What is your attachment style? You know, in conflict? Do you tend to go more avoidant or more anxious? And finally, growing up, were you shown how to deal with big feelings in a healthy way? So keep these questions in mind as you listen to my coaching call with Megan.

Megan, welcome to the show. How can I help? Hi Christine. So I would like some coaching around communication when anger is present, particularly in my relationship, I think, you know, my husband and I really value growth and communication. But when there’s anger present, I feel like I forget everything I know about healthy communication and we’re not really like angry people in general,

but anytime it comes up I kind of think, how is this, how is this still happening? Like I kind of, I even like beat myself up a little bit that I’m, I feel like I’m human. That’s a much better way to put it. I was gonna say such a bad communicator when there’s anger. Well, I don’t think anyone communicates well when there’s anger because you’re in a completely different part of your brain.

Hmm. You are in more your Hulk brain, you’re in the part of your brain that’s ready to fight. It’s ready to kill. Do you think that, you know, like this is a dramatic example, but think about war. What part of a brain does someone need to be in to kill another person? Yeah. Yeah. I can’t even imagine.

My brain like doesn’t wanna go there. Right? But your brain goes there in terms of being in that dysregulated state that you can’t communicate. When we’re in that part of our brain, we don’t make the best choices. Mm. We aren’t in the part of our brain that accesses empathy, being resourced, all of our tools and skills, you know,

cognitive functioning, rationality. Hmm. Like none of that stuff is accessible when we’re in anger. So I just wanted to start with that. So, you know, I think a lot of times, especially those of us who’ve done a lot of work and have a lot of tools in our toolbox, judge ourselves when we are in moments where we look like an amateur and we,

we look and behave like someone who’s never listened to one podcast or read one personal growth book. So you’re, you’re not alone in that judgment. And I just encourage you to, to forgive yourself for that because your brain can’t access those things. That’s the first piece. So what I wanna ask you next is, is there a particular pattern or a particular thing in your relationship that creates the anger?

Mm, that’s a great question. I don’t think there’s a particular pattern, it’s just, I think it’s so jarring because we don’t generally get angry a lot. And so when it does happen, my entire system kind of goes into like a panic and it, I feel like I like just revert back to like old versions of myself in the way that I am talking and acting.

When you say old versions of yourself, what do you mean? I feel like just the way I communicate, like I feel like in general I am always happy to give like spaciousness in a conversation, but when there’s anger I’m like, I push and push and push and I’m like, we need to talk about it now. We need to talk about right now.

And I get so anxious if he needs space, which is usually the pattern that happens. Like he wants space when there’s anger and I’m like, I wanna talk about it right now. And that just kind of heightens the anger even more. And are you familiar with attachment styles? I’m familiar because I’ve heard on your podcast, but that’s about as far.

Okay. Well it seems like you go into more of an anxious when you’re in the insecure, which happens when we go and break down in a relationship and he goes into more avoidant. Or it could just be the way that you deal with anger, you know, like you really need the resolution and he needs space to, to regulate which actually is the healthier choice.

In this example there’s a difference between withdrawing and punishing Yeah. Versus taking space. Which do you feel he’s doing? Yeah, I feel like he used to withdraw, but he is been doing like some therapy and work around this as well. And now he just very healthily asks for some space and that kind of like freaks me out, puts me into a bit of a panic.

Okay. Let me ask you this, what was anger like in your home growing up? We didn’t really see a lot of anger. I can remember my dad getting really, really angry with me like one time in my teenage years. And I remember him telling stories about his dad having a lot of really big anger issues. Like he was quite abusive.

And so I think my dad tried to not show a lot of anger. And then my mom, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen her angry. Like I would almost say I feel like she doesn’t have the emotion of anger, but I know that she does. Yeah. And would you say both your parents were emotionally available? Yes. Question mark?

No. That doesn’t sound like the most convincing Yes I’ve ever heard. Yeah. We’re just not like, I feel like the emotions are there but they’re not really spoken. Like I remember when I first got together with my husband and I heard him just like constantly telling both his mom and dad like, I love you. And they said, I love you back.

And like that’s just like, it’s definitely not a thing that I say like with my dad. Like we almost never say like, I love you or express any of that emotion. But I feel like, I don’t know, it doesn’t feel like an unavailability. It just feels like an unspoken thing. Okay. Well if it’s unspoken, it’s unavailable in some way.

Right? So there’s something in you that goes into a bit of a panic as you said, when it feels like connection has been lost in some way. Would you agree with that statement? Yeah. Yeah. That feels true. And I feel like there’s like a fear that like he’s gonna like decide this fight has like ended the whole relationship. Which is bizarre ’cause we’ve been together for 10 years now and that’s never been something on the table.

Right, okay. So if you were to ask that voice Hmm. That that part of you that’s like, if this doesn’t get fixed now or if like I don’t get reassurance now, this could mean he’s leaving me forever. Could you just ask that part of you what it needs in that moment? Trust comes through. Yeah. And what makes that part think doesn’t have trust.

It feels like I’ve done something wrong and I need to fix it. Right. There you go. Yeah. So I’ve done something wrong and I need to fix it, otherwise I’m gonna lose love. Yeah. How long has that been around? Definitely since like that feels very much like my teenage self. Okay. Tell me more about that. Well my,

my very first like relationship I was in my very first boyfriend, he was quite like emotionally abusive, would just kind of, if I did something wrong, like there were, I don’t know, he would like kick me outta the car and make me walk home. Like kind of break up with me if something happened and then kind of love bomb, bring a bunch of gifts and say sorry.

So that’s what comes up right now. Okay. So that experience, what beliefs do you think that seeded for you about relationships and love That any issue is my fault. Not Yeah. That I almost have to, I have to make sure everything’s perfect to like hold the relationship together. Wow. Yeah. That’s a big responsibility. Yeah. And in those moments where your husband asks for space and part of your brain interprets that as an alert that the relationship’s not okay,

then the next part of you is gonna go, you’re failing and is going to scramble to fix it. Yeah. Yeah. I even feel like if he’s just like angry at something in the day, my, I feel like my whole nervous system is like what can I do to make it better? Like, it’s like immediately on alert that’s like not even about me at all.

Right. So I think that that comes from both the relationship you were in and having two parents that repressed feelings. ’cause as a child we are so tapped in to what our parents are experiencing, whether they outwardly express it or not. Yeah. So there probably was a part of you that was really grasping for like what is really, what is the temperature in the room right now?

Like there’s what everybody’s acting like but like what’s really going on? And so I think there is a part of you that’s like scanning and assessing and wanting to make sure everything’s okay. So when we don’t have, like, when we aren’t taught about emotions and we aren’t taught how to express our emotions and we aren’t taught how to regulate our emotions and we don’t really co-regulate a lot with our parents when we’re kids feelings feel really scary.

Ours and other people’s. Yeah. And so I think there’s a part of you that both thinks you need to fix it based on trauma from this past relationship. And there’s a part of you that just isn’t super comfortable with big feelings because it wasn’t something that you really grew up with. Yeah. I can do big joy. Amazing. Well joy is generally a safe for feeling.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, and often people that can do big joy have a hard time with anger ’cause it feels so scary. Yeah. Right. Especially other peoples. So if you, you don’t have children, correct? No. Nephews, nieces. Are you around kids at all? I have nephews and nieces, but I’m not around them often.

Okay. Well you’ve seen them once or twice. Yeah. Yes. Have you ever seen them have a tantrum? Oh yeah. Okay. What happens happens to your body when they have a tantrum? Mm. My body, I feel, yeah, I feel fine if a right. Yeah. Right. Why? Because what are you making their tantrum mean in your mind?

I feel like I just know that it’s temporary. Like it’s just, and it’s just Normal. Yeah. And there’s a part of me that’s like, I, I wish I could just like throw my body on the ground and just like kick my arms and legs around. Like, that’s awesome. That little kid can do that. Maybe you need to,

Hmm. Maybe the next time you’re angry you need to do that and let it all out. Because what it seems like is happening is, you know, anger is moving energy. Right? It’s like it’s not a still energy. It’s a very like fiery energy and it needs an outlet. And if it isn’t expressed and isn’t given a safe outlet, it’s gonna do other things.

And in your case it goes graspy, fix it, fix it, make it work, talk to me now. And anger is a very active energy, right? So you’re looking for an action to deal with it. And so there’s, there’s kind of two visuals I wanna give you. When your husband, you know, is angry or has big feelings or whatever or needs space,

just look at him like a toddler. He’s having big feelings and him going to have space is his version of lying on the floor and kicking. And maybe what you can do is go in the bedroom and lie in the bed. ’cause that’s a little more comfortable and like, just let yourself have a meltdown. Yeah. And then after you have your release and he has his space,

then you can have a conversation. Yeah. But expecting yourself to go into like this conscious, totally empowered, amazing conversation when you both are triggered. That’s, that’s a big expectation actually. The really healthy thing to do. And something that is very conscious is when do people are angry to actually go both their separate ways, release that anger in whatever way it is and then come back and have a conversation.

Yeah. Do I still like give myself grace after that space? Or in Well, yeah, I just, I foresee like is the pattern still gonna be there if I give myself space? I guess. I don’t know though until I try it. Yes. So what I hear you asking me is if, am I still going to have that need to go and try to fix it with him even if I give myself a release?

Is that what you’re asking me? Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. And am I, yeah. Is there like, I guess I’m asking, is healthy communication in anger, like an accessible thing? Is it possible? From my perspective, not really. Mm. Not really. Yeah. I’ve never seen two people that are really angry at each other have a really conscious,

healthy conversation. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like I just haven’t had that modeled. Like I, I, yeah. I just feel like no one talks about talking when they’re angry and so it feels like I’m just doing it wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Well listen, you can still there, there’s still ways to have conversations when you’re triggered. Hmm.

But what it sounds like to me is because there’s so much fear that comes up when there is anger, there’s this part of you that thinks you’re gonna lose the relationship. It’s hard to access that part of you that can have those more healthy conversations because there’s such a big trigger of loss happening. Yeah. And that’s what you’re more invested in in the moment is preserving the relationship.

So your survival brain is triggered. And when we’re in survival brain, again, we don’t have access to the other parts of our brain as much. But what you’ll find, I think after you allow yourself to have your own version of your temper tantrum, like remind yourself that your husband taking space isn’t him leaving the relationship isn’t going to be over reminding yourself you didn’t do anything wrong.

Then I think that in future conversations where it’s not maybe such heightened anger, but just attention Yeah. You can move more into person responsibility and say like, I’m feeling really triggered that X, Y, Z you know, and there’s definitely possibility to have tense conversations and tough conversations Yeah. And can be triggered and still, you know, have more of that conscious conversation.

But when we’re, when we’re too much in survival brain and we’re too triggered, it’s better just to take space and then come back. Yeah. And and work on repair. Yeah. That feels like it would feel really good. Well it does. Yeah, It does. So next time you notice yourself, you know, getting angry or in a fight with your husband or whatever it may be,

practice those things. Yeah. And when he again, takes space, just imagine him as a little toddler, like going to his room. Like I see it now when Athena gets upset, she like walks away and goes and lays her head down like somewhere else. She like takes some space and gets her feelings out and then she wants to come back for a hug.

Yeah. And I don’t chase after her and go, are you okay? Are you okay? Like we have to fix this now. Like, okay, she’s taking some space, she’s, she’s dysregulated and she’s actually doing what feels instinctual to her to do. And if you can see that as your husband taking care of himself Yeah. Not leading you,

that’s gonna be really helpful. Yeah. I think so. So what’s been your biggest takeaway from our conversation? The, the space can be enough to dissipate some of the maybe unhealthy charge. And I think there’s a lot in trying to move my body during that time as well because I do definitely like just go sit. Like I almost like put myself in like timeout.

Yeah, yeah, Yeah. Yeah. So I think sitting when you have a lot of anger is like, is really hard. Yeah. So the fact that you said when you saw your niece or nephew lay on the floor and flail around and that looks pretty appealing to you. That to me is direct guidance from your higher self going Yeah, I want some of that.

Yeah. Yeah. That feels true. It does. Yeah. Yeah. ’cause you might not have been, you know, might not have been safe for you to do that in your home. Not that you would’ve gotten, you know, it just might not have been energetically, you might not have felt like that was okay because there was so much repression going on.

Yeah. As a kid you probably learned you had to repress too. Yeah, I think I do. And then I use kind of like sarcasm to like voice my anger instead of actual Right. Communication through it. And I feel like even just the movement can can shift that in itself. Yep. Absolutely. Does this help? It does. My brain is like we wanna see it in action.

Yeah. Well here’s what I’d encourage you to do. Do, I would encourage you to go back when this episode airs, take notes and then practice it and you can actually talk about it with your husband about Okay, next time we’re both triggered. Yeah. Here’s our plan. Yeah. And talk it through. Yeah, I definitely think that’s a great idea.

’cause we were even talking about it before this episode because I was like, I just want, I just want to clear this. And so I love the idea of making a plan together. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah. You got this. Thank you. Anger. Anger doesn’t mean the end of a relationship. Yeah. It doesn’t, It’s just part of it.

It’s a feeling. It’s not fact. It’s a feeling. Feels really real in the moment and it’s a feeling. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. That that right there feels really, really, yeah. Landed for me. Thank you to Megan for your honesty, for your willingness to discuss how anger is impacting you in the relationship. So let me just start by saying those of us that have done a lot of personal development work can sometimes have pretty high expectations and high standards of how we should communicate and how other people should communicate to us.

And we need to remember we are human. And when we are in an argument, when we aren’t in a regulated state, it is often very difficult to be like, oh let me use some nonviolent communication right here. Or let me step into taking personal responsibility and use eye language. What I have found personally and professionally works best is realizing that we’re in more that Hulk brain more that triggered brain and go,

okay, let me take a breath, let me stop and I’m actually gonna go either release this anger in a healthy way or take some space for myself. Because when we think about, alright, what does quote unquote conscious communication look like in an argument or when we’re angry? ’cause a comment I made that I wanna clarify was that I’ve never seen two people that are angry at each other argue or have a conversation in a really conscious,

healthy way. And what I mean by that is two people can be angry at each other and have a healthy conscious conversation. But when they’re in the anger, like when the anger is present right then and there, it’s harder. So Steph and I have definitely had conscious conversations when we’ve been angry, but the anger, we weren’t like in that Hulk brain.

We weren’t in the triggered state. We were more talking about the anger, using eye language, taking self responsibility versus being in the anger. Because when we are in the emotion of anger, we’re not super great about not being defensive. We’re not super great about taking personal responsibility. We’re in more a protective mode, a defensive mode. You know, if you think about it,

anger is a useful emotion. It alerts us that, wait a second, this is not okay, something has crossed a boundary for me or that like this is not okay with me. And so being like, hmm, what’s my personal responsibility? And that that’s not the part of our brain that we’re in. So can you be angry at someone and still have a conscious regulated conversation with them?

Yes. And it might be kind of tense at times, but you can still stay in more the part of your brain that’s not defensive, that’s not blaming and that’s not projecting. You can talk about your anger, you can talk about what’s upsetting you using that eye language. But it often requires taking a step out of the dynamic, getting into more regulation and then having the conversation.

You know, and in Megan’s case, one of the key things like, well two key things. One, she didn’t see the healthy expression of emotion. So one thing that’s so important for children to see and experience for themselves is a healthy expression of emotions. You know, being angry at children or having explosive, reactive, heightened emotion a lot of the time.

Not healthy, but you know, showing what anger looks like. For example, if you’re a parent, let’s say you’re a father and your boss or coworker did something that really made you mad at work, you may be home coming home and talking to your partner and say, I’m so mad, I’m so mad that this and this and this and this,

and I’m feeling really angry about it. That’s okay. And you know, you might even at times have gotten angry at a spouse or angry etiquette. And that’s not necessarily quote unquote wrong. It’s all about repair. So, so much about relationship is rupture, repair, rupture, repair that actually makes for a secure attachment. Now I wanna make an important distinction between anger,

you know, someone getting triggered versus emotional abuse. Those are two very, very, very different things. It’s natural for human beings to get mad sometimes directing that anger at a child in an abusive way, not healthy. So for example, let’s say a parent saw their child playing with a glass face and they said over and over, please don’t play with Adam as you know how to play with it.

The child kept doing it, it broke. So the parent may say, oh, I’m really angry that you broke that. I asked you not to play with that and I’m angry that you didn’t listen to me. Okay, that might be a very natural expression that isn’t damaging. That’s very different than a child who starts yelling at the child. I told you not to do that.

Why don’t you ever listen to me? You’re such a bad kid, da da da da. And then it gets worse if there’s any kind of physical abuse. So that’s what I mean about, and that’s a trite example. But we don’t wanna hide from our children emotions that we’re feeling. Either that we’re feeling about them or that we’re feeling about life in general.

We wanna show them how to healthily express something and show them how to repair after we’re angry. And that’s so important for our inner child as well. So for Megan, it’s so important for her inner child to see that people can be angry like her husband in this case, and it doesn’t mean she’s going to lose love. So we had the never seeing emotion from parents at home.

So anger being really scary because like if you grew up in a house without any anger and repressed emotions, of course anger’s gonna look scary. And then add to that, the abusive explosive boyfriend who on some level she probably subconsciously attracted because there was a part of her that was craving. Like, what does not repressing look like? You know, when we have something in one extreme,

we often subconsciously go and attract something in another extreme. So those two things make anger very scary for her. So again, in this show, I’m I’m, I love to help people connect dots, especially if they don’t have the awareness yet. But it’s always then what do you do with it? Right? Because my job is more than just like,

let’s connect dots. It’s like what do you do? So for Megan it’s a practice of doing her be best to take a deep breath to see her husband as a toddler, right? Because she can see like a toddler temper tantrum, no big deal. Like he’s just releasing emotion to see it that way. And then go re release the anger in her own way.

Because like we talked about in the show, anger has an an out energy to it and she’s dealing with her anger by getting graspy with him and wanting to fix it. That’s more that anxious attachment style. Whereas if she had a healthy release of it and she could support her husband and having a healthy release, then they’re much more likely to come back and have a healthy conversation.

All right everybody, hope you got some good takeaways from that show today. Sending you so much love and many blessings. Until next time, thank you for listening to Over it and on with it. I love hearing from you. So please post your comments or questions at christinehassler.com/podcast. That’s also the place you can sign up to receive coaching from me in an upcoming episode.

And if you love this show, please share it and subscribe in iTunes. You can find all my social media handles and sign up to be part of my community at christinehassler.com. Until next week, here’s to getting over it and on with it. Much love and many blessings.