Overcoming Anger
Anger is always the result of false judgment that one has been harmed; understanding this dissolves its grip.
Seneca's treatise On Anger is a masterpiece of psychological analysis. Anger arises when we judge that we have been wronged, that the wrong was serious, and that we deserve remedy. Challenge any of these judgments and anger dissolves. Additionally, recognizing our own faults reduces righteous indignation toward others.
Anger is a brief madness.
Seneca devoted a whole treatise, De Ira (On Anger), to diagnosing anger as a judgment that can be caught before it takes hold.
Epistles
Written about in
- What Stoicism says about anger
Seneca's analysis breaks anger into three judgements: that you were harmed, that the harm was serious, and that it deserves a remedy. Doubt any one of them and the anger loses its footing.