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Anxiety and anger or just two of the myriad emotions that people feel. And for some reason, we are prone to *own* them in a way that we don't own our other emotions.
We own them by saying things such as, "my anxiety stops me from _____", or, "my anger causes me to _____."
If we provide care and feeding to these two particular emotions and make them a character trait we have, rather than an emotion we feel, we are telling ourselves that these emotions control us, or that there is nothing we can do about what these emotions bring out for us.
I encourage kids to refrain from using *my* with these emotions and instead apply the emotion to the situation in which it arises. This sounds more like:
"The anxiety I feel when I am meeting new people."
"The anger that I feel when things don't go the way I want them to."
"The anxiety I have when I have to speak in front of the class."
"The anger that I feel when I'm not allowed to do something I want to do."
The emotions in this context lead us to the issues causing these feelings and the roots of the emotions that can now be addressed.
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