A Chinese proverb says, “if you can be patient in a moment of anger, you will escape 100 days of sorrow.” It’s wise advice, but we all know it can also be tough advice to follow if you’re prone to angry outbursts.
Yes, you may feel remorse for it afterwards. But do you understand why you get angry, if it’s your usual response to stress? And do you know what your angry outbursts are doing to those around you?
Arguably, there’s plenty to fuel fury on the farm. In a high-stakes business environment, even the longest fuse can burn to its limit. Difficulty controlling emotions, irritability and angry outbursts are sure signs someone is under stress. Plus agricultural workplaces can be relatively isolated, and those who work in them are often in prolonged close proximity with family members.
Read Also
Why do farmers hate paying taxes?
It didn’t take long in my accounting career to learn that farmers don’t like paying income tax. No one does…
That kind of work environment can be where someone prone to anger finds it possible to vent more often than they would in an office environment or workplace with unrelated co-workers.
There can be another reason why farmers, men especially, can be prone to anger, says Cynthia Beck, an MSc candidate in clinical psychology at the University of Regina who works in rural mental health and farms with her family in southeastern Saskatchewan.
“Society has taught us that some emotions are more acceptable than others. For men, anger is an acceptable emotion,” Beck says. “I think we may not realize how ingrained that is.”
There’s another cultural link too. Farmers are culturally conditioned not to show a lot of emotions, says Beck. “We’re a stoic, self-reliant bunch.”
In this context, it’s important to know that is a learned response. If we are often angry, we were likely taught at a young age that outwardly showing anger is a coping mechanism.
“For a lot of us, we’ve learned it can be a very effective coping mechanism,” Beck says. “Anger is derived from frustration, but anger is also a very effective coping tool. A lot of people use anger as an avoidance strategy. If they don’t want to have a conversation about something, such as a touchy subject, they’ll get angry, and people usually drop the subject. The avoidance strategy is successful.”
What we don’t know
We often have little awareness of our anger, or why we respond with anger when things get beyond our control, says Beck. “Anger is an habitual response. For some people, our brain and body will naturally respond and progress to anger before knowing what’s really wrong.”
It’s a habit that can be passed along from family member to family member as we learn by example. Those who tend to get angry a lot may have learned from living examples, even their parents, that anger is the way to deal with a stressful situation, she says. That’s how anger can be harmful to the mental health of everyone involved.
“If a farmer, male or female, has really big anger problems, they may be dealing with challenged mental health, and chances are they grew up around a parent or a family member, or watching a worker on the farm deal with things with anger. They dealt with stress or adversity with anger, and the generation before that did, and perhaps the generation before that.”
There’s no end to situations that can prompt one to get angry, of course. The unrelenting and intense schedule of farm work and deadlines takes its toll, too.
“We sometimes live chaotic lifestyles, and our income and our future basically rely on our productivity during high-production seasons,” Beck says.
That’s not typically when you’re going to be all that aware of your habitual anger response, she says.
“When you’re in the moment and swept up in the pace of life, there’s so little time to make a point of being self-aware and to acknowledge the emotions that we’re experiencing. Quite often we’re operating from a fight, flight or freeze mode. That’s the evolutionary system within each one of us that influences how we deal with problems. It’s a combination of instinctual and learned behaviour, and when it comes to those instinctual or habitual behaviours, we don’t have a lot of awareness around them.”
Practical help
Beck offers some basic, practical advice for those who get angry a lot that can help them and also help end the cycle. To start, some self-care can help.
“A lot of times when people are really angry, there are a few basic factors impacting the anger response,” she says. “Did they get enough sleep? Have they drunk any water that day? When was the last time they ate?”
One way to help the person in the immediate moment is to give them space and let them finish their crisis response to the stress. Do not tell them to calm down. Once they have cooled off, offer them a bottle of water and a snack.
“Chances are they’ll say no, or they might throw the water in your face. But even if you can say ‘take a minute and eat this,’ or ‘drink this water,’ you’ll give them time to finish the stress response.”
Saying anger is an accepted emotion isn’t to say it’s an acceptable one, Beck stresses. Her first question of any farmer asking for help with their anger is to guide them to be more self-aware, asking them what their coping strategies are, with the goal of developing healthier ones.
“I would encourage them to start taking note of what their habitual response is. I’d ask, for instance,‘If you’re out sorting cattle and it doesn’t go your way, what do you do?’ Just having someone talking about their anger response in really concrete terms helps to create awareness. The next time it happens and you are yelling at the people who are trying to help you, hear yourself and then feel free to stop right then. Your helpers won’t mind! It’s one way to start taking small steps to changing behaviour.”
Also focus on managing that anger both in the moment and for the longer term, she emphasizes.
A better farm
Anger isn’t good for your own mental health, nor that of your spouse, your kids or your employees.
“Think about it. You literally are teaching your children how to cope with stress for the rest of their lives. And is your coping mechanism healthy? No, probably not. Your anger affects the mental and physical health of the people around you.”
The young people she sees struggling with anxiety or depression usually didn’t develop it on their own, she adds. “Family system and social environment play a role.”
And if you need another reason to learn to manage your anger, think about the implications your behaviour will ultimately have on your farm operation, too.
“It affects the bottom line,” Beck says, then adds, “Success isn’t only about the money. It’s about the health and well-being of the farm operation unit, and all of the people there are working towards the common goal of making that operation a success. If people are missing out on physical health, mental health and emotional well-being, then productivity is going to diminish. It’s like operating a tractor with only three tires: costly, unproductive and unnecessary.”
