Skip to content

Angry Much

Back in late last month, I wrote my last blog post! I had made a decision that I was going to stop writing blog posts. I received a number of calls and emails expressing that they wish I would continue. Not really sure yet! I am going to write this one as I think it is pretty telling in today’s environment.

An old friend ask; “Why is it that you are not angry?”
Me; “What do you mean angry? Angry about my where I am today? Angry at our current political situation? Angry at the world? What exactly?”
Friend; “Well, I was wondering that we are both growing into that age where we start to see the “angry old man” syndrome. Why are you not like that – yet?”
Me; “Wow”

I have been around man of the old angry men in my life. I have witnessed it first hand! I have witnessed it on-line. I have witnessed it in the media. I have witnessed it just about everywhere. You all know the type, they are angry with everyone they come in contact with. They say things that are mean and hurtful. They don’t care. They go to restaurant’s and mean to they help. Maybe some of them a letting their closet racist out. I heard a bunch of angry old men say, “there they go speaking Mexican again.” I guess saying Spanish is difficult for them.

I had to remind him that being angry is a choice. Back many years ago, I took a seminar that focused on how we react to stuff! It simply pointed out that no matter the situation how we let ourselves react is our choice. There were many examples that were shared, but this one was very telling and spot on for my work position at the time. You’re a supervisor and when you first walk into the office – you get news that your area that you supervisor is lines down. Crisis time. You pull the team together to work on fixing the situation. You find out that your main person for the specific area has called in sick. His second in command is on vacation. There is very little expertise to help. You start the process of figure out what is happening, when your boss asks for you attendance in a meeting ASAP on the situation. You walk in the meeting and you get peppered with questions and folks demanding solutions ASAP. Which is your job! You tell them what you know so far, what you are going to do and tell them they will updates every 10 minutes until the situation is fixed. Their somewhat happy and you go back to fixing the problem. When you are walking in the area, you overhear one of your team talking to another team member, “what mood do you think the supervisor is in? I have to leave for the day. I have to attend to a family thing.” Before the one employee answers. The supervisor says, “we are lines down and need to get back up ASAP. We need all hands on deck.” Next up she gets a delivery from a local flower shop. Flowers from the significant other… We have two reactions that can come that situation. First one that many in the seminar mentioned, “What has he done know?” Very few went after the, “he loves me!”

We all get to pick our reaction!

There are many more angry people out there these days. Is it easier to be angry today? We get to see finger pointing and deflecting everyday! We get to hear things that we wish we never heard. We get to see dysfunction in our government. Treating human beings as people is just too difficult for many.
The simplest way to put this – Being an old angry man and its reaction depends on who you are, what you want to be and how you are going to react.

I chose to take action if I don’t like what I am seeing, hearing or witnessing. I do it in as positive a way as possible. I do it respectfully without name calling or labeling. Instead of dividing we should be doing everything to come together. I used to tell my teams that our differences were part of our team strength. Open our ears and minds and we will learn so much!

So, before you want to be labelled an “Angry Old Man/Women” stop and think before you react!

Published inObservations

Be First to Comment

Leave a Reply

%d bloggers like this: