Buddhism is not saying that if you have anger you’re a bad person and it’s all your fault. Rather, it’s saying that the anger is the unskillful element in the equation of sensing that something should be done — and that’s what you want to deal with.

"Real injustices are being done out there. The question is: what to do about them? Often we see a situation that we don’t like, anger arises, and we try to think of what to do about the situation while the anger is still in the mind. From the Buddha’s perspective, the problem is not so much that we want to do something about the injustices, but that we allow the anger to color our perception of the situation and of what should be done. So he’s not telling us to simply accept things as they are and try to swallow your anger, feeling that we’re to blame for the anger. Rather, he’s saying that we have to deal with the anger in such a way that it doesn’t get in the way of responding in an appropriate way, or a skillful way, to what we see as wrong.

Once you get the anger out of the way, there are two things that can happen. One is that you may see that the situation is not as bad as you thought it was, but simply that your opinions had colored the situation. The other is that you can see the situation really is that bad, that something should be done, and the question is: What, when, and where? In other words: When is the right time, where is the right place, and what is the best thing to say in that time and place? So Buddhism is not saying that if you have anger you’re a bad person and it’s all your fault. Rather, it’s saying that the anger is the unskillful element in the equation of sensing that something should be done — and that’s what you want to deal with.

The main problem with anger is that it tends to block out certain parts of the mind. There’s a kind of clarity that comes with tunnel-vision, but it’s an unfortunate clarity, for often, after the action is done, you’ve got to live with the regret as your mind begins to open up and you see, from a larger perspective, “That was really stupid; I shouldn’t have done that.”"

~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Antidotes to Anger"

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