Is Anger Killing You?

We've all experienced anger and being on both the receiving and giving end. When we're on the giving end, we don't tend to spend much thinking about whether it's harming us. This is probably because we feel like we've just got rid of really strong emotions, so there's nothing else to process. What I'd like to challenge you to consider is this - did all of the yelling and saying angry and ugly things help you truly let go of the hurt?

Has it been weeks, months, or even years since you were hurt and yet you can still feel that anger just as intensely now as you did then? If you can sense your jaw clenching, your heart rate speeding up, your breathing becoming more shallow, and even your face feeling hot, then the truth is you probably didn't expel the hurt when you expressed your anger. The outburst was simply an expression of the hurt, but it didn't contribute to your healing.

When you hold onto anger, whether you feel angry or not, whether you think you're angry or not, it will continue to live in your body and wreak havoc with your physical health in a number of ways. While anger may put you in a fight or flight mode, chronic anger keeps you there. This is dangerous because it keeps your body flooded with cortisol and adrenaline, which lead to long-term health issues such as heart disease, high blood pressure, digestive problems, and a weakened immune system. Living in a constant fight or flight state means that you are highly likely to experience sleep disturbances, insomnia, anxiety, brain fog, and even constant muscle tension and fatigue.

Are you beginning to not just see, but truly understand how dangerous anger is for your physical well being? Let's look at four systems in your body and the ways anger directly impacts them.

Cardiovascular System

• Causes high blood pressure

• Makes your heart rate spike

• Causes long-term hardening of arteries

• Causes inflammation

• Damages blood vessels

Heart

• Increases risk of heart attacks

• Increases risk of strokes

• Triggers arrhythmias (dangerous and irregular heart rhythms)

Digestive System

• Negatively impacts the connection between the brain and the gut

• Causes stomach pain

• Bloating

• IBS (irritable bowel syndrome)

Immune System

• Hormonal imbalances

• Reduces effectiveness of immune cells

• Higher rates of infection

• Systemic inflammation leading to higher risk of disease

While we have been focusing on long-term, chronic anger and what it does to our bodies, it's important to point out that even an intense outburst of anger can reduce your immune system's functions for several hours! The changes that happen with your heart rate, your blood pressure, and your immune system increase your risk of depression, heart disease, diabetes, and stroke! *Mayo Clinic

How Do I Stop All of This?!

If all this has started to sink in deeply, you're probably wondering what the heck you need to do to stop these impacts, reverse them, and get them gone! I'm not a doctor or a medical professional of any kind, but I do know that one of the best things you can do to stop anger in its tracks is to forgive the person who hurt you.

Did you know that researchers have studied the impact of forgiveness within the body and discovered that it significantly LOWERS stress?! *John Hopkins Medicine

Not only that, but forgiveness reduces your anxiety, your depression, and helps to lower your blood pressure, improve your heart health, and boost your immune system. Do you realize that within one sentence, we just learned that forgiveness REVERSES the effects of what anger caused?!

Let me repeat that - forgiveness undoes what anger caused. How powerful is that?! Do you have goosebumps reading that like I do?

God is amazing beyond anything words can express! He knew that we would hurt one another, that we would be hurt by one another, usually those closest to us, and that we would harbor anger in the deepest chambers of our hearts where it would mature into bitterness and slowly spread it's diseased fingers into every aspect of our physical bodies.

God loves us and doesn't want this kind of life for His dearly loved children. This is why He tells us to forgive one another just as He has forgiven us. It's not simply a command to be nice, play nice, and share. It is deeply rooted in a desire for us to be well and whole and enjoy the life He has given to us.

If you're reading this and feel like this is a nice idea and something you'd like to do at some point but it just doesn't work for you right now, let me ask you to at least consider this - if not now, when? Time is going to continue moving forward and your physical health is going to continue to decline the longer you hold onto your anger. You may not see or even feel the effects yet, but that doesn't mean that anger isn't working it's poison throughout your system.

If you feel helpless to say the words "I forgive you" right now, start by talking with God and ask Him to help you want to forgive. Forgiveness is a process, not a pickup order. Being ready to say the words doesn't mean you're at the finish line, it actually means you're in the starting blocks. So if you can't imagine even saying the words, then you need God's help to get you to the starting blocks. You can't do this alone and you shouldn't try. This is a hard journey but it is SO worth every tear, every step, every prayer.

I challenge you today to ask God to help you want to forgive the one who hurt you, pray this consistently until the day you realize you are in the starting blocks and ready to start the journey to complete forgiveness.