Our experience in dealing with clients is that anger management classes or programs are generally not effective.
The typical kind of anger management class teaches people to “get in touch with their anger” and to “express it” or “get it out.” These kinds of classes include things like punching bags and using foam baseball bats to club imaginary adversaries instead of taking it out on nearby loved ones.
Studies have shown that this approach actually makes people angrier and more hostile, not to mention more entitled to act out their anger. Participants are training their brains to associate controlled aggression rather than compassion and reconciliation with anger.
Other types of anger management classes teach the angry person to identify behaviors that set them off. They then work to make those behaviors less provocative. Techniques include things like ignoring it, avoiding it, or pretending it’s funny. The reality is that it is the person’s of inadequacy and sense of entitlement — not specific behaviors — that trigger the anger.
Even if the class succeeds in making them less sensitive to your specific trigger, it does not get to the root source. Desensitizing doesn’t work at all on hidden anger or resentment issues, which is the precursor to most angry and abusive behavior. People typically resent hundreds of things, not just one.
When you’re resentful, you are constantly scanning the environment for any possible bad news, lest it sneak up on you. Anger-management classes try to deal with this constant level of arousal with techniques to manage it. Deliverance ministry can get to the root source and thus offer a lasting and satisfying solution rather than a band-aid.