Violence is any attempt by someone to control another.
Violent behaviour is stopped only when people learn enough about themselves that they develop the tools to understand their thoughts and feelings.
This is hard. Their violence may be verbal, physical or emotional and show itself in many ways. But the key to all violent attitudes is an unwillingness to take the responsibility for handling yourself instead of others.
Counselling tools for doing this have typically been called anger management courses. This is the wrong name. You don’t manage anger. Anger is a real emotion we all experience at times. We need anger education.
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For the past four years I worked on developing a new approach to anger. Thanks to my brother-in-law in Edmonton, this program is in on the internet, and people can work through it at their own pace. It is not a course. You don’t do assignments and then pass. You have to live it, and like many other aspects of life, such as successful parenting, successful relationships, dealing with addictions or other personal problems, you must keep practising the program if you are going to own it and make it part of you.
The program can be found at www.lookingglass.ca/petecope.
There are 12 sections to the program. Each section takes several hours either individually or in small groups to work through. Topics include how anger is created, how to stop being aggressive, learning assertive ways to communicate, dealing with conflict and criticism and learning to be forgiving and trusting.
People can print it off the computer and study on their own. If they don’t own a computer, they can get a copy printed at the local library for a fee.
Peter Griffiths is a mental health counsellor based in Prince Albert, Sask. He can be contacted through his website at www.sasktelwebsite.net/petecope.
