Sunday, November 02, 2008

The Nelson Mandela Approach to Dealing with Anger

Aware of the way the US Presidential elections are raising the anger levels, Ed and Deb Shapiro offer this prescription for anger from the life of Nelson Mandela:

“But we need not let anger stay in our system, as seen in Nelson Mandela's response to Bill Clinton soon after Mandela's release.”

“Clinton asked him if he wasn't feeling really angry the day he walked away from twenty-seven years in jail. ‘Surely,’ Clinton said, ‘You must have felt some anger?’ Mandela agreed that, yes, with the joy of being free, he had also felt great anger. ‘But,’ he said, ‘I valued my freedom more, and I knew that if I expressed my anger I would still be a prisoner.’”

To read the entire article:

Ed and Deb Shapiro, Ducks Don’t Do Anger, The Huffington Post, 30 October 2008.

Dr Geoff Pound

Image: Nelson Mandela on the inside.