“Canine Potty Habits, Anger and Aristotle”
I do a reading from a twelve-step meditation book for some of my fellow-addicts each morning. Unbeknownst to me, I prepared for the reading by taking the dog out to do her business.
First, I should tell you a bit about our dog. She is several years old and is pretty good about doing her business outside—except when she isn’t. We still put down a pad in the hallway just in case. So, I got up early this morning (5:00 a.m.), put on the coffee, and went downstairs to take our little dog outside. I figured she was good to go (pun initially unintentional) since my wife had taken her out fairly late last night. I was mistaken.
I began to get angry, but I checked myself. “I’m not going to fly into a rage about this,” I told myself. And I didn’t.
I went upstairs, poured my coffee, opened the message app on my phone, brought up my text message group, and opened my twelve-book. Here is the epigraph, a quote from Aristotle, that began the reading:
“It is easy to fly into a passion—anybody can do that—but to be angry with the right person to the right extent and at the right time and with the right object and in the right way—that is not easy, and it is not everyone who can do it.”
Whoa!
The Bible says, “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger;
for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. (James 1:19-20, English Standard Version)
Way too often, I get things all turned around. I am quick to speak and get angry and slow to hear. We talk a lot about “righteous anger”, but how often is our anger actually righteous? Very seldom, I suspect. We don’t handle our anger very well. In fact, we don’t handle it at all. Anger man-handles us.
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