Siddhartha Gautama, who is also known as Buddha, once said, “Anger will never disappear so long as thoughts of resentment are cherished in the mind.” This statement holds a lot of truth in it when it is analyzed psychologically. Anger is a psychological problem that starts in the mind. It always occur when one has some sense of resentments in the mind, either because one feels shortchanged or a feeling that something did not go as per the expectations.
The mind will be disturbed as one tries to imagine how the incident took place, and why it happened the way it did, and not in the manner desired. This will create a lot of disturbance in the mind. The mind will not settle as such an individual would be trying to reflect on why the incident took place the way it did. Recent psychologists have confirmed that anger is always a reflection of the mind’s status. Depending on the level in which the mind is not at peace, anger will always be reflected in various forms.
Understanding the nature of anger would demand that one knows factors that affect the mind. Scientists have demonstrated that the mind controls all the activities of an individual. Anger is a sign that an individual is not pleased with an act of another individual or a given process. It is a sign that the mind is not at peace with that a particular person or process. This distress in the mind wills illicit anger.
Depending on how massive the disturbance is in the mind, the resentment may take a shorter or longer time to be eliminated from one’s mind. As long as the resentment still exists, the anger will persist. Various factors will determine how long the resentment will last. For instance, when an individual is constantly exposed to the source of the distress, the resentment may take a longer time to disappear. This may be a case where one’s property is taken by another, but due to corrupt legal system, one is unable to recover the property.
When the property is taken away to a place the original owner will not be able to see it frequently, it is possible that this owner may overcome the resentment after a while and he or she may eliminate the anger. However, when the property is constantly at his or her sight, the thought that the property was once his or hers will keep the resentment burning.
When the resentment in the mind is kept alive, it is almost impossible to eliminate anger. This is because anger is a manifestation of resentment. It is an indication that the mind still refuses the fact that a given event happened in a way that is just. When one resents something or someone, there will develop a feeling that one should act in a manner that will be considered as settling the score.
When one develops such a feeling, then anger cannot disappear until the score is settled. The feeling can only disappear either when one forgets the incident, or when one feels that some form of justice has been served. As Buddha puts it, anger can only disappear when the feeling of resentment disappears. This is because when resentment is eliminated, the root cause of anger shall be eliminated.