How to deal with anger with Dr Arpita Gupta DePalma MD

Hello, everyone and welcome to the podcast this week. I have one of my dear friends, and fellow life coach, Dr. Arpita Gupta DePalma. Dr. Gupta De Palma is a certified life coach and runs Thoughtwork, MD so I'm so happy to have you here. Tell us a little bit about yourself. 

Hi, thank you for having me. It's so good to talk to you, I just I miss seeing you so just knowing we're connecting over the ocean. 

Yeah, so tell me a little bit about you

So I am. A retired paediatrician. I also kind of  co-founded, my husband's Medical practice, and manage that.

But really my career has shifted towards working with women, professionals, and women physicians over the past 2 years with mindset coaching and it just it was not anything I would have imagined 5 years ago, if you had said that I'm doing this, or I'm speaking to women and helping them with it with issues with regards to how they're thinking about things, and I would have been like, yeah, whatever I don't know what you're talking about so it's just kind of funny how things evolve over time and things happen. Very unexpectedly at times, and it's all meant for a purpose. So yeah, it’s so fun. 

So tell me, how did you become a life coach, when you were a paediatrician

So I actually back in 2000 I practiced, and we moved to Richmond, Virginia, back in 2004, and I was a part-time paediatrician for about 8 to 10 years and then my practice, asked Me to go full time and at that time my husband We were just opening his practice, and our kids were little probably like 5, and 7, same thing. And so we just decided that I wasn't going to do that. I decided that that it was too much for me to take that on full time, and so I stepped down from that position, because the ultimatum was full-time, and I just thought I'm gonna find something else part time but while. I'm doing that, I'll kinda keep myself busy with the office. And that morphed very quickly to me, being so engrossed and meshed with the day-to-day operations of the Medical Practice, and a lot of that stemmed from the perfectionism that I had as a physician, because now I'm creating and building a new entity for my Husband and his Practice, and of course that reputation had to be excellent right, and so everything had to be spot on, and so what happened was me starting with a part-time Paediatric Position that was maybe 16-20h/week, to me morphing into this Administrative role, in his Practice at almost 80h/week, and you know the the ability to even consider working again, Part-time Paediatrics was not on the table, because I felt like I was so needed in his practice. That way, and that's started to build a lot of resentment and anger you know over time. You know I was never asked or expected to work as an administrator in his office. I just chose to do that. And I realised I was doing that to kind of make myself feel worthy, valuable, important. But at the same time my brain was telling me he's not letting you, practice or your husband because of this you can't practice peace and so that kind of began, that anger spiral. So fast-forward, 10 years later, I'm still in this role, and Covid is about to hit, Covid Hits, right so first we're already put out because we've been working non-stop hardcore this entire time. And then Covid hits the practice, and we shut the office down for 8 weeks, because not elective procedures were stopped in Virginia, and when we reopened 8 weeks, later, we slowly started to ramp back up and and get everything on on par and then within I would say about 3 months, we lost all 100% of our staff over time. Like over this next 3 months, and that's when I really kind of hit a wall and was super angry thinking, you know, we supported all these people we really wanted to make sure everybody had themselves taken care of, we were dipping into our savings to pay for them, we weren't taking a paycheque for ourselves. And so I called my friend Melissa, and explained her most of the person, she's a Paediatrician, my Paediatric Residency buddy also a coach at that time and kind of just complained and she helped coach me a little bit about it and then I realised, wow, I'm really in control of what I'm creating by how I'm thinking and so that's what started my journey on Coaching. I really binged a lot of podcasts, just to learn about it. Learn about the concepts of Mindset, Coaching, and then I decided again to be certified, but really for my own sake. There was no intent to start a business and then within a couple of weeks, I'll be signing up for certification I was, like, you know what I want to offer this to other people.

Yeah So so that's kind of what led to the whole process of getting me here to where I am with offering this to other women, but a lot of that initial strife, was that anger you know I was showing up so angry with my kids at home like it would be totally well, for the most part, totally professional if I look back. Now I sometimes would probably have behaved in a way that I didn't find respectful to myself. But I would come home angry and irritated and resentful, and that would they would be the ones experiencing, that and so I realised quickly that I only had a year and a half left with my daughter at home at that, time before she left for college, and I didn't want to not have a relationship with her after she left. And so that's what was really my main incentive for how do, I change my behaviours at home so i'm not so reactionary all the time.

Yeah, I love that so much. There, was something that happened. Like Covid happened and you noticed that this wasn't the way that you wanted to show up.And you did something about it, and not only did you do something, about it.You decided to train as a coach and help others do something about her. That is so inspirational. Thank you so much for sharing that so I know you you basically deal with anger, so you are an anger specialist.

So tell me how your anger morphed whilst you were doing this Coaching Work

So what I realised is that anger had become my outlet. You know it had become my pathway of a release, of emotions that were building up because I wanted to feel better. And so what in the moment, in the heat of the moment, feeling that anger or or expressing the anger, help me feel powerful, help me feel like I was still in control and but I wasn't recognising with I really wasn't right, and I was the behaviours that I was portraying through that anger, really was lessening. My you know ability to explain things, troubleshoot build relationships, or connections. It was not really helping me, but it was just almost a essentially a dopamine heit of that response that it makes me feel good. And it's giving me this false sense of being in control.

So immediately, I I mean, I had recognised I mean I remember way back when even before I started doing this, work, that I would constantly be thinking, why do I keep showing up that way I regret it after the fact I feel like crap after the fact it's not helping our relationship. I know the result of this, but I can't help but keep doing it, you know. And so that's what I had to start really recognising why was I doing it. And First First First Awareness was, oh, yeah, this is helping me feel, like, I have some sort of control. If I get Louder or angry, or maybe then they'll listen. You know. So the different thoughts that I was having about it was what was causing me to show up that way. 20. Took a step back and started really looking at it, and realising that I wasn't having the result, the end result. I wanted I started to change. How do I want to show up instead, you know how do I want to build awareness about what sets me off in the first place and then how do I create a plan for how I want to show up on one of those activators, are present so

I mean, I can really resonate with that, because I know that me personally despite being a coach despite, you know, knowing all the tools and despite using them to actually help with not shouting at my kids and things but sometimes well, a lot of the time I still, do because the anger, does like bubble up and you know, I try and be calm, calm, calm like for the first 10 times, and then it's like and then scream at the kids, right and I don't realise that it's probably a response from childhood and I think that a lot, in the in our culture It's, this there's, a lot of anger, being a bad thing, you shouldn't be, angry, but also on the other side of things, a little, bit, about when someone is angry at you, that means you've done something wrong. So someone shouldn't be angry at you. And so I remember the way like my parents were angry at me. It was like I would feel so much like shame and like be like Oh I've done something wrong. Let me try and correct that so what is your take, on the cultural element of anger.

I think it goes 2 ways, because, like you said initially, that when we have anger, we feel like we shouldn't have it.You know that it's not okay, or correct to have it, or to express it, and that kind of sets us in a trap as well, because when we don't express our emotions, they just build up and then essentially they do come out, eventually we we know that so but what has happened here is that when we are trying to withhold that anger or show up in only that's, you know we're turning inward, or just withdrawing from interaction. So that we don't show up that way. That doesn't allow us to express those feelings. And so sometimes we can feel angry, but not necessarily show up angry. Express, the Anger Right so recognising that it's okay, and that also applies to the second half of it like, you said, like, you know, when somebody shows up angry at me that means i've done something wrong. Right. Each person has their own thoughts in their brain, of what's causing them, their thoughts, or what's, causing them to be angry. And so they get to decide if they're angry and then they get to decide how they want to show up when they're angry, and it really has nothing to do with you, right so you get to decide, then they're showing up angry. How do I want to think about that the culturally going back to that I would say, You know, it depends. I think some families. It's hard to say, I wanna say, it's I feel like saying it's cultural. But I I also feel like there's so much evidence against both. It's really individualised, you know, that one family might say, we don't show our anger, we kind of involute and then what happens is that builds the resentment because you're not practicing, those feelings and that causes more disconnect with your relationships, with those people, and that leads essentially to family strife, as a smell, because you're not having that feeling of sense, of connection with that those people, so if allowing yourself to recognise that you're angry and just sitting and being present, in it, noticing where it's showing up for you in your body how does it feel

And allowing it to be there. Is what allows us to kind of work through it.

And we can kind of get through those emotions, those heated emotions in the sense and then think more effectively with how we want to respond next, you know, and then on the other hand the people, that like Kind of blow up with it it's the same thing right you know, instead of it's because we don't wanna feel those emotions, and so the response the reaction is more ethic like Our go-to for it, and most of the time. When we have anger and it's reactionary like that it's because we have an underlying emotion, that we're trying not to feel right anger, is a lot of times the secondary emotion there's something underneath that

That's more painful for us that we're avoiding feeling, and because we want to avoid feeling.It we show up with anger, because we know how that's gonna end up at the end right. Even if it's even if it's not good, it's familiar, it's comfortable. So we want to do that instead.

Yeah, so, 2, things, the first thing is, it's really interesting that you said that anger, is often a react like, we often react to our anger.And it can show up in 2 different ways, mostly 2 different ways. So either kind of like you know, going inwards, and just like not talking about it, and disconnecting or like you know, shouting, screaming and actually letting it out but they're both reactions, they're both kind of like just different forms of a reaction and when we are reacting to it. We're not feeling it. We're not allowing it in our body, and so then it makes it much worse.

Because it's not actually being dealt with, and then it kind of just, is still simmering in this, in the in the surface right. That was the first thing that was like really interesting, but the second thing was that you said that anger is normally, like how it shows up, but there's normally, an underlying emotion. Tell us a bit about that like what kind of underlying emotions normally show up

Oh, it can vary for everybody, it's so widespread, I'll I can tell you a little bit. About mine what is it what they work is it a lot of times, you don't even recognise when you're in in it.But the number one thing for me. That would cause my anger would be the sense of urgency or time scarcity.Right so we don't think that that would be something that causes anger.But when we're like hurry up, kids, hurry up put your shoes on.Let's go let's go and then you're starting to yell at them.Because they're not doing it, you're trying to get out the door.It's that sense of urgency that we have to be somewhere, and these people are preventing me from doing that.

Right. So for me, it was a sense of urgency, and it actually went back to that residency checklist check in and check out, list right between when we change shifts that all these things need to get done I have to hurry up and get them done in my shift and then I have to also rely, on the next person to be able to take over, do it as well, and so that urgency, that I kind of sense from that I feel, like that's where I and initially started having that another area for me personally, was that low self worth right and so some of your clients if they're Dealing with the weight loss is feeling that ache or the pain of feeling, low self worth it's hard and we don't want to do that so rather than doing that we show up angry.

So for me, it was working all hours of night, right extending the amount of time I was working, because I was trying to prove how worthy I was, how valuable I was, and that was exhausting me on top of it, and I already had these annoying feelings of I'm not really contributing I'm not really helpful here, in the family or in the Household and that makes your your your not wanting to deal with that emotion. So you show up more angry instead. But really it can be anything shame, disappointment, right like, so if your your child doesn't win the award or doesn't get certain commendations, at school you might be angry because you don't want to disappointment, of that either if your child does something wrong, or if you for for your clients, if they're not, eating, or they're, not able to stay on their food, plan, or their diet, plan that you've put in place, that shame, around that rather than feeling the shame they show irritable, or frustrated, or angry with other oh they have a very short fuse.

Yeah, that definitely, shows up with my clients. And often it's to their family members. And so often like it may be to their partners, and then you know, they get something called hangry so when they're actually hungry they associate like being angry, then because they don't like that sensation in their body so then they're thinking I shouldn't be feeling hungry which makes them feel hangry, and then they associate them together, so that often comes up where they feel hangry. Another reason that it comes up, often is when they are not achieving the goals that they have expected themselves to achieve so say that they wanted to lose at a certain amount of weight, and then they didn’t, they may feel angry at themselves, and then actually, like you know put a lot of pressure on themselves and restrict even more because they should be achieving them, but actually the underlying emotion often, is shame or disappointment or kind of like feeling unworthy as you said, they're often the the main underlying group causes. So it's so fun to actually go in and actually deal with that root cause and be like, hey, it may show up as anger, but actually let's really find out, what's, going on for you here because as you said, it's different for different people and whatever they're thinking will lead to their emotion, and lead to how they act. Right, so like, actually getting to that root cause is is I said, it's fun. But it's like it can sometimes be quite intense, but also so like worthwhile, right

Completely. Because if you don't start working on that first, the secondary emotion is gonna keep happening. Right.

Yes.

I would I would be curious to know also with your clients.If a lot of it comes around blame like oh, they don't.

They know I'm trying to lose weight why are they offering me this food? Or it's Christmas Time. I'm not. They shouldn't be inviting me, or bringing having such a big spread of of food.You know, so that blame it's so much easier to project on other people, and be angry at other people than to feel.You know the maybe those feelings of deprivation, or whatever when you're going to these events or have the options in front of you that you're really trying to avoid so Yes, that shows up so often. And then also it's much easier to blame someone else than take responsibility.

Because it's kind of easier to put it onto someone else than to actually be like, Hey, let me really look at what's going on for me inside here rather than like, blame it on my husband, for bringing the the cake or whatever right I know I was one of those people when my husband Pulled something, he would be doing it with so much love.

He'll be like, oh, I bought this for you, and I've been out. Why did you bring me the cupcake, I'm on a diet again, and he'd be. Oh, I have Look at me, like are you like, are you okay, like, I'm doing it out of love and you're like screaming at me, I'm like, you know that is just how it was but now it's so funny.

Because when he brings it, I can. See the love, because I'm like choosing to see that so sometimes I tell my clients is okay, where do you think your partner, was coming from do you think they wanted to jeopardise your weight loss attempts do you think that the wanted you to you know go off your diet, plan and scream at them and everything. And the answer is, often no, they would do it out right

Yeah yeah I mean, it's it's tricky. How our brain, works. Right. It's trying to keep us in this situation, that we are correct and we are believing. What we want to keep us safe. What's familiar for us. And so that that's where you have to kind of really be aware of what You're Thinking and What's going on in your head, and that's where we catch it.That's where you kind of can start to make that change. For how you want to show up. So

Yeah, okay, so I think. Tell, me, how can we start like normalising anger. Because I think that's a really big step, isn't it in like making a change. So tell me what you what you think about that

I think the first thing, to give yourself grace and love, and know that everybody gets angry and it's a normal emotion that is present in in all human beings and it's not it doesn't mean that something is wrong with you it doesn't mean that you can't control yourself it's. Just we might have now developed the automatic pathway to respond that way. And there are ways that you can start to become aware of that, and then shift to create a new response pathway that you're going to practice and it's going to get stronger and you're going to be able to shift, to that being your your default. And your go-to rather than the reaction. So that's kind of like the first thing to recognise there's nothing wrong with you, I mean, I was I'm a Paediatrician right and so a lot of shame that I cannot believe I'm showing up this weight with my kids I'm supposed to Be A role, model for not only my kids, but other parents, so that was really hard for me to overcome initially, to say, hey, I I need to I should be better than this right but then, recognising everybody has this Option that like people show up this way, and this is normal because what we feed, is gonna grow, so are we going to Shift, feeding it a different way. So we have a different pathway that we want to respond to the first thing. I tell people is just really to become aware of what our they're treating what sets them off what are their activators, and then be mindful of that so you can start planning ahead so one of the things.

For me is when with my daughter back, then when I was reacting so much is that she wouldn't even have to say anything, she could just look at me and her eyebrow would go up and immediately my thought was I realised now that I was thinking is that she's Not listening to me or she's not. She doesn't care. So that immediately sent me down this path of anger, and she might not have done anything other than being curious, right, but it was something about that eyebrow going up so being aware of what activates, you is super important.

And making a plan for how you're gonna respond. Then when you're in that situation is next, and so what I did also with my husband is he told him. This is what i've noticed since me off with her. so when you notice that this is happening, and I'm not following my new plan, maybe just have a check in with me. Can you say hey, do we do. You want to take a minute for something?Or just help me, distract myself, help me get onto my protocol in the beginning too. That was very helpful. so having somebody on your team there.But, but, yeah, so then, I basically now recognise that when she does that I need to take a minute, right? I, take a deep, breath, I remind myself. There's no urgency to respond to whatever's happening. Right.Now I'm the one that's creating that urgency and I make an excuse to leave. Hey, I need to go to the bathroom. I'll be right back or let me go check one thing.I'll be right back, and I'm actually just excusing myself from that situation. So I can take a minute to take some breaths and calm my nervous system down right? So I remove myself. I take some more deep breaths, taking a minute to calm that system down and then i verbalise what I'm feeling and in the beginning, what we verbalise is I'm Angry I'm Resentful I'm Irritated I'm Frustrated, right and that's because in the beginning, that's the only emotion that we feel that we're having later, we've done this for for a while you start, to recognise those underlying Emotions right beginning, you just want to verbalise it you want to acknowledge it, so that you can hear. Yes, I see that this is what's going on. And that's okay.

I love that I love that you said that because I find for me, I often feel angry with my kids as well, and I often feel that shame as well, like oh, my gosh, I meant to be a Life Coach I meant to be an example of what's possible for my people. I'm always talking about feeling my emotions, but actually I'm Reacting to my emotions with my children, and the first thing that I often do is like normalise it that of course it's, hard with 2 active, young boys who are saying no to everything you're saying like, It's okay, that you're finding this tough like it's normal to find things tough, and also to kind of just be like how does. I even say to them. I'm just feeling my emotions right now, so they're like mommy, what are you doing? And I often just say to them, I'm just taking some deep breaths.I'm just calming myself down. They're like, why?Because I'm feeling angry, right now, oh, money! Are you angry at me?I'm like no I'm feeling angry myself because of the thoughts.I'm thinking. Oh, did we make you angry, I'm like no mummy, mummy's angry because of what she's thinking.But then, so now they've started to pick up on that as well, that.And so when I when I sometimes in error, saying you've made me so angry. There'll be like no mummy. Your anger comes from your thinking. And I'm like that's not helping the situation.

I'm making I'm getting even more angry. Now, but it's so fun that they're starting to pick up on that.

Cause, it kind of reminds me that, yeah, they're right. It's because of my own thinking. So yeah, just coming down my nervous system, go, taking some breaths, and often just like, I often even just like just close my eyes.

And just like, notice what does it feel like in my body? Can I just be with it, and the more. I'm like wanting to get to push away like resist it. The more like it blows up. But when I could just be like hey, this is normal that I'm feeling angry so I actually talk to myself, sometimes and put my hand on my chest and say, it's normal to feel angry it's completely, okay, you've not done anything wrong. This is just a very normal human emotion, and then it kind of helps. My nervous system to get on board and be, like Oh, okay. This is normal nothing's gone wrong. This isn't dangerous for me, and I can I can process this, so, yeah.

100% that's. That that was a great point that you brought up right?So most of the time when we feel emotions. It's going to be also in our body and we a lot of physicians, especially have kind of Ignored, our body's queues signals, so sometimes that's, building that awareness, first, because that might be the first place it shows upFor you, is where is it in my body. Okay, my tent shoulders are tense.Why is why are they tense something is coming up for me. Let me let me just cue into that I plug into that and and focus on that.

But yeah, when I remove myself putting your hand, on where that tension is or where the sensation is in your body and breathing into that slowly for 4 breaths or 4 s in and I, hold it for 2, s and then exhale for 4 s, that really is sending the signals to the brain that We're safe. It's okay. There's no danger, like you said. Exactly and so then you know, once you've kind of processed that you've labeled the Emotion.You've you've kind of given yourself a minutes to calm down.You get to decide. Do I want to go back and handle this situation right now, or do I want to go and say, you know what I I don't know if I'm gonna be able to show up still, the way. I want to I'm still a little bit tense with this. So I'm just gonna say, I can't handle this right. Now, or this is not a good time let's schedule a different time to come back to this and we'll revisit it again. So those are kind of tips to help you either diffuse it immediately. So you don't have to deal with it right, then, or if you feel like you're calm down enough and you're able to address it in a way that's effective then you can go back but that key is that urgency too we create that for ourselves you know when our kids say something to us or when somebody is saying something to us and we're taking it as an attack on us, our reaction is to respond right away to protect ourselves and recognise them. We don't have to do that. We're not fighting those crazy caveman tigers and bears and stuff.

We're just here in life. And the dangers that we have in life, really are not like they were although our brain is still programmed to react that way

Yes, I know, once I was getting coached by Bev Aron, one of our Mutual coaches, she's Amazing and She was Coaching me on my Parenting and she gave she Sent me this Book which I'm Reading, at the moment “Raise your Kids without Raising your Voice” so I'm in the process of reading that right now, and they talk about how in terms, of the Parenting.

Try and give them directions 2 out of the 10 times. So 8 out of the 10 times, you just talk to them. And I was like wait what? Normally, I'm like directing them: come on, why haven't you done that yet? Why have you done that yet, and that is the thing that's creating my anger? Because I'm assuming that they're not listening to me, and then the disrespect to me and I'm That's all the stories that I'm creating in my head so I'm really trying at the moment, to fill the urge to like tell them what to do right I'm trying to make it a game, and things like that is really like like intensive for my brain, because I'm like deprogramming the old Neural pathways, and reprogramming a different Way, of like doing it, and I'm not saying It's easy but it's such good, work because every single time, that I'm like, directing them. I'm like hold on. Is it the 2 out of 10 Rule? Like, have I and what my day, and then then you become so much more aware of it, and you'd be like. Oh, right. Okay. It's me that's causing it, not in a blame kind of way, but in a way that I if I'm causing it. I can deal with it. As well, I can change this and that is so empowering to know, right?

Totally 100%, one of the other things I I remember Bev, saying somewhere was respond to the content, and not the tone, and so that is really that was so helpful with me with the kids, especially when their teenagers like when they're little I Feel like now, maybe it's, because I'm not in it as much now that you recognise that that's what they do. They have tantrums 2, 3, Year Old, 4 Year Olds. Even they do those obnoxious behaviours. But what I found myself struggling with is as the Teenagers. I was expecting them to behave as adults, and so there were responses in the reactions with their tone was what was getting me? And so the eyebrow was part of the tone. So responding to their what's just what they're saying? If somebody else is saying this to you, not your child, I'm just reading the words, how would you respond to it? And that was that's been helpful and the other, and the other little piece that's always been helpful with with children in particular is I mean, we don't want to have this external validation, from other people, but just recognising that everybody is going through the same thing, it's not just your kid acting that way. They all act that way. The fact that they're challenging you and the fact that they are making it difficult means that they have their own being, their own self, and starting to grow, and explore, that and you want that right you don't want us subservient, kind of child you just listens and does everything you say all the time. you want them to kind of challenge you, because that's going to be their incentive to do that as they get older as well

Oh, my goodness, I love that you said that because Vivaan, my oldest he's so good like outside of our house, like, yeah, everyone would be like, he's an angel child. He listens. I get like glowing reports from school and as soon as he comes home, it’s kinda like this new person like because obviously everyone has a fifty-fifty existence 50% positive emotion 50% negative emotion.

So as soon as he comes home It's very much like no Mummy, and like all of this emotion comes out. And there's like loads of like you know, like talking back, and things like that. And I used to get really annoyed at that. But now I'm learning to to realise that I feel so honoured that he can actually let that out, to me and if he can let that vulnerable side out to me just imagine how close we must be it doesn't even show it to anyone else. In the whole world, so if he can do that to me I feel so honoured, and I often even say that to him or Vivaan let it out it's okay, I know that you're letting it out because you can do it to me this, is amazing don't worry. Let it out. And then he just like I don't know it diffuses really quickly, because he's like, Mom, gets me oh, okay, she accepts me even when I have these negative emotions. It doesn't mean I'm unlovable. It doesn't mean, I'm not accepted, is she and I often even say, even when you, when you talk back to me, I love you and he's like really I'm like, yeah, I love you, but I don't often like, what you're saying to me. But I still love you, and then he's like, oh, wow! So it’s kind of fun to kind of like you know, plant these little seeds into them, because like to know that they growing up with this kind of information that we never had so fun

Exactly that that's I think one of the key points and you know everything happens to us, the way it's supposed to to make us who we are. But I also do believe, that these tools that we have this gift, that we're able to give our kids.Now is going to help prepare them for the world and life, as they get older, because we have shifted away from that connection and the interactions with people. And so being able to regroup and recognise that we need to kind of shift, back to that. I think this work is definitely helping us, do that with our kids.

Yeah, it's so fun.

So it's it's and the proper, yeah, for creating that safe space, for him, right, this is a safe space for him for him, to be able to have that outlet and that going back circling back that's exactly what my incentive, was for with my daughter because because with her going to College, I was afraid afraid that that relationship was going to slowly dwindle, if we were leaving it that way, and we have an amazing relationship now, right and that's been awesome to see her you know, being able to coach or she had a little bit of anxiety with public speaking so coaching around how to manage her thoughts, with that and how that's impacted the way.

She's able to show up now it's it's, huge, and so now you know when I get the text I need to talk to you about zone. So you know I never got that in high school. I never. He never really was one to say, Hey, can we talk about this? So now I know I've created that safe space, for her and that's that was the ultimately the only goal I had soYeah, I mean, that is so amazing that our children feel safe to talk about the most vulnerable parts of themselves.

And to share that like how awesome is that even if we don't coach like I often say, if I don't coach anyone else in the world just being able to do that for the kids, is like like so much, like, right so cool yeah, so thank you so much, for sharing all of that do you have any any other tools to help with anger that we haven't covered yet.

Yeah, I would say just a couple of little nuggets that I like to talk about is the Pain Bodies, so Pain body is when we're kind of in this low-lying funk and Ekhart Tolle, is the one that kind of talked about this and this was like such an eye opener for me. Because I realised that I was doing this with my husband, like whenever he was in a funk, or I could tell he was not in a great mood. I would sit there and poke at him. Come on. Let's talk about it. What's going on tell me, tell me tell me, and I was making it that I needed to know not recognising.That's actually making it worse. And so just having that awareness that when you're in a pain body or somebody that you love is in a pain, body any communication, or kind of processing at that time, really is not going to be efficacious and so having the ability to be aware of that and then step back and let them have their space or let yourself have that space is huge, because once you've processed through it, then you can go back and be much more communicative.

So that's been very helpful, the other nugget with my spouse specifically, was having a conversation with them when we were not angry how I was going to start changing my response when we were and so this was also with intention because I didn't want my new behaviours, to be misconstrued as being passive aggressive, and so I just sent him, you know I'm doing this work on the singer, you know that I've been doing coaching and so I am gonna show up differently, sometimes and what I noticed with him is when he was angry about things not even related to me or anything. I would become in green. And those are those mirror neurones find you know, like we take on the energy of the people around us, and I realised I really didn't like that I was already dealing with enough anger is it was, so I didn't want to take on this so what I did is I just sent to him when you're angry in this conversation, when we were not in a 10 space, when you're angry I might just leave I might just excuse myself, and that's not an attack on you that's not me being passive aggressive but what I realise is when you're angry. I become angry, and then we just feed off each other and it doesn't do anything productive. And that really was huge I mean it sounds so simple, like common sense but we never express that to each other, you know, and so once we started doing that that really brought a lot of peace, because what we would come home, from work, you'd come home from the office, tense or i'd, be coming home from the office, tense. We both be tense about different, things. Or maybe one was tense, and the other wasn't and we automatically both would become aggravated, and so we wanted to really bring more peace to home, and that's one of the ways we did it. We've also made put boundaries in place for what we are gonna do.No, we're not so once we get home. He's great about this now, like we're not talking about work. Once we get home period. It's it's not in the offices, the Office and We'll talk about it there, and so that those are all little tidbits and Tips. That have really helped kind of Change the Anger that's, been with the relationship at Home with him, so

And, just, one other thing about, like, just, to add to that I find that with my husband when I was trying to be superwoman, trying to do Xy and Z to do the business and do the kids stuff, and like you know be able to manage everything like I'd been conditioned to be like that is normal that's what you have to do, and when I was actually be able to be vulnerable and say, I'm struggling with this this is something that I need some help with how can we actually, problems, solve this together that actually made us much closer. So even though initially, my anger was turning into resentment thinking he should be doing more or he should be helping out or anything like that I realised that when I wasn't feeling angry, as you were saying when I talked to him about it, and like problem, solved it was actually it was hard for me, to actually be vulnerable, and say i'm struggling, here let's like work something out but that changed everything, because then we were able to figure out a way to deal with it when we went both angry and screaming each other. So it's really really fun, so, yeah, I think I think those tools are like, so so useful. So thank you so much any last minute, tips for my listeners.

Just build, your awareness, every single day. Just ask yourself, what am I feeling? What am I thinking? Where is it showing up in my body just different things that you can ask yourself to be more aware of what's showing up for you that's always the first step in any of the work, that we're trying to do that that that's, how I would I would kind of send everybody off you know and then also the one. Last thing is to verbalise your expectations, like you were saying with your husband, because we assume, they should know a small enough, because we've been married for so long or together. For so long, when we don't verbalise it, it doesn't get communicated. So verbalising is very, very important.

I love that so much. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast, today, it's been so useful to have your perspective. And how can my listeners find out more about you.

Oh, awesome well, they can find me. My website is www.thoughtworkmd.com

I'm also on Instagram and Facebook at Thought Work, MD

And Linkedin is my last one that's my business Linkedin page, is ArpitaDePalma so that's how they can reach out to me and I would love to hear from anybody if they have any questions about this

Yeah, and I know that you have got a new anger course that is out so, just tell us a little bit about that

Yeah, so what I decided to do is put together A self study online course talking about anger, Why it shows up how we can kind of work with it? And then specific situations, like with our families, or spouses, or employees, or other individuals, all the different areas where anger might show up in our life. So I've done a little I think it's 11 modules online course with you know Supplemental Homework, and etc. Etc. That if you're interested in doing that. And that way, you can do it on your own. And if you're a physician, it's actually qualifies for CME credit as well, so you can use your CME dollars.But but yeah, so, hopefully, that's something that might be of interest to some people, to do a self study if they're struggling with some anger

That sounds so amazing. Thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate having you on. Alright, take care, bye.

It's been a blast, thanks Amruti.