Even getting angry has a price

Have you ever wondered what’s the true cost of getting angry when things go wrong?

I was thinking about it just yesterday morning. Shortly after waking up, I experienced three negative events in a row: I opened my monthly contact lenses case just to find out that I didn’t close it properly, and one of them was torn in half; while I was wearing the chain necklace I bought in Santorini this summer (which I really care about), it broke; I discovered that my Apple Watch’s tempered glass screen protector got dented, and even though I had a replacement at home, I almost ended up throwing it away too because I tried to install it in a rush.

The combination of these three occurrences immediately led me to say, “Right, this is not a good day,” and I could feel my blood start to boil. Normally, that signals that I’m unlikely to make smart decisions until I’ve had time to calm down.

However, this time I managed to resist the impulse to let anger take over. I went out, sat down for a coffee, and slowly felt my frustration fade away. What helped was focusing on the potential consequences of staying angry all day. We often don’t realise it, but when we wallow in self-pity, we tend to make poor decisions—and over time, those bad choices slowly start to add up and to make a negative impact on our lives.

Learning to quickly return to a balanced state of mind took me months of discipline and meditation, but it’s become one of my most essential skills. In my opinion, it’s one of those every productive human being should learn.