(Un)caged: Repressed Anger The Silent Killer in Modern Masculinity

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Repressed anger is the root of many masculine issues, creating a pressure cooker that eventually explodes in harmful ways despite men's denial of their emotional state.

• Men have been conditioned to hide emotions through phrases like "suck it up" and "man up"
• Repressed anger destroys relationships by creating emotional distance and disconnection
• When we repress anger, we also shut down our ability to feel other positive emotions
• Anger is a secondary emotion covering feelings of betrayal, humiliation, and invalidation
• Step one for healing: acknowledge and own your anger instead of denying it
• Express anger constructively through exercise, journaling, therapy or men's groups
• Forgiveness is crucial - it's not about others but freeing yourself from victim consciousness
• Anger exists on a spectrum from death-instinctual (destructive) to life-instinctual (constructive)
• The same energy behind anger can unite people for positive change or destroy lives
• Transformation happens when we allow ourselves to feel the full spectrum of emotions

Men, we need to come out of hiding.

If you liked this episode and you're ready to confront and process your repressed anger instead of letting it wreck your life from the inside out, then it's time to join us.

The Gathering is my online men's group where we talk about the stuff most guys are afraid to admit — anger, shame, relationships, self-sabotage — and actually do something about it. This is where you stop pretending and start showing up for yourself, your relationships, and the man you know you're meant to be.

Ready to get real? Sign up now at https://www.manuncaved.com/the-gathering — and let’s start breaking the cycle together.

Need support? Our free recovery services and weekly support groups are here to help both individuals and families affected by addiction and mental health challenges. You don’t have to do this alone. Schedule a free, confidential call today and start the healing process for everyone involved.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, gentlemen, grab your mocktail, kick back
and let's get into it.
Welcome to another episode ofman Uncaved, the only podcast
that gets straight to the pointand doesn't make you feel like
crap about it.
Today, we're going to talkabout repressed anger and its
impact on masculinity.

(00:22):
So, guys, buckle up.
This one is going to sting alittle bit, but I'm hoping in a
good way, like a slap to theface from reality that makes you
say, oh shit, I've been doingthis all wrong.
Now, if you're one of thoseguys who thinks anger is a bad

(00:43):
word, like, oh, I don't getangry, I'm just passionate
Newsflash gentlemen, you'reprobably in denial and, quite
frankly, you're doing it wrong.
So let's get started with theclassic.
How many of you and yes, I amlooking at you, mr, I'm fine

(01:04):
have convinced yourself thatanger is for those other people?
You know, those ones who slamdoors, punch walls and rage,
quit video games like a bunch ofamateur adolescent kids?
You, oh no, you're calm,collected and completely zen

(01:26):
until one of those most trivialthings send you into a rage
spiral.
And here's the kicker Angerisn't bad, it's the repressed
anger.
That's the problem.
That shit gets you, guys.
I'm telling you that shit getsyou.
I talk about that repressedanger all day long in my groups,

(01:50):
in my private coaching sessions.
You'll have guys talking abouta situation and they posture up,
their tonality becomesaggressive.
And when you ask them thatquestion, are you angry?
No, I'm good, straight updenial.
And it's that denial of thatrepressed anger that is the

(02:13):
problem with a lot of men.
It's that repressed anger.
It's like a unopened bottle ofsoda in the kitchen cupboard and
at first it's just sittingthere, right, no big deal, but
over time it starts to buildpressure.
Then one day you open it andboom, everything explodes.

(02:37):
And if you're lucky, the onlything that's ruined is your
self-esteem and maybe yourrelationship with that person
you just snapped at over a wrongpizza topping.
So let's talk about the originsof that beautiful mess.
Why are we so damn bad athandling our anger?

(03:01):
Men for generations have beentaught that showing anger is a
sign of weakness.
And think about it.
Growing up, were you ever toldto suck it up, man up or don't
cry?
Like a little girl, if you hada rough day or got upset, the

(03:22):
response was be a man.
Well, guess what that'sbasically telling you?
Hide your feelings, pretendthey don't exist.
So here we are, years later,suppressing our anger so deep
inside that we've forgotten howto express it healthily.
Instead, it leaks out in allsorts of fucked up ways of

(03:44):
charming ways, passive,aggressive ways, workaholism,
emotional withdrawal or, mypersonal favorite, blowing up at
the slightest inconvenience.
And we still wear this toxic,stoic man armor like it's cool.
Well, spoiler alert, it's not.
It's actually suffocating.

(04:05):
All right time to dig into thereal impact of the suppressed
anger.
Let's talk about relationships.
Gentlemen, let me ask you doyou have a tendency to clench
your jaw whenever somethingbothers you?
Or maybe you just don't talkabout it and instead let your
partner guess what's wrong?

(04:25):
Oh yeah, that's healthyNewsflash.
Repressed anger ruinsrelationships.
You know that.
Look, your partner gives youwhen she says what's wrong, and
you reply nothing.
That's the moment you shouldprobably fess up to your
unresolved anger, but insteadyou bottle it up, keep it hidden

(04:49):
and let it fester, and overtime, all that repressed anger
becomes a time bomb, tickingaway until you explode over
something completely trivial,like her not putting the laundry
in the dryer the right way.
Yeah, we've all been there and,honestly, I've been there too.
I was so unaware of how muchanger I had bottled up one from

(05:14):
my childhood experience.
There's societal, environmentalthings, and I just continued to
push it away.
Because I also had to recognizeand I heard a lot of stories of
my father was a very angry manand what he did with his anger
is he acted out on it.
He would act out in compulsive,with drinking, behaving in

(05:36):
fidelities, raging all over theplace, getting in fights.
So I learned very fast well, Idon't want to be that and we
also think about it from anenvironmental lens.
We always see these angry menin movies sometimes, or we see
it in our news, these men whoare acting out violently on

(05:59):
somebody or, unfortunately, agroup of people.
So this is something I had todefinitely in my own
understanding, in my own healingjourney, really get a deeper
understanding of what wasdriving a lot of my behaviors.
Most of us have probably heardthat anger is a secondary
emotion and I believe it isbecause under anger, when you

(06:22):
start to understand what isunder anger is sometimes
betrayal, humiliation,invalidation but also get more

(06:46):
specific in understanding whatwe are actually experiencing so
that we can get clear andcommunicate from that
perspective.
Repressed anger doesn't justhurt your partner, it hurts you,
it actually builds walls, itcreates emotional distance.
It leaves you feelingdisconnected and isolated.
We all know that loneliness isthe root of just about every

(07:09):
unhealthy behavior you can thinkof, from binging on junk food
to you guessed it porn addiction.
Now you might be asking allright, great, so I'm fucking
angry.
So what?
Well, first let me tell you whyit matters.
When we repress anger, we alsorepress our ability to feel

(07:31):
other emotions too.
You can't selectively shut offyour anger and keep your
happiness and peace.
It doesn't work like that.
You can't turn the emotionalfaucet to off for the ugly stuff
and leave it on for the goodstuff.
So guess what?
You end up emotionally numb,disconnected, on autopilot,

(07:54):
going through the motions butnever really feeling anything,
including joy, passion orsatisfaction.
Oh, and all the while, the anger.
It's still bubbling underneaththe surface, just waiting to
cause a meltdown, the momentsomeone cuts you off in traffic.
Cuts you off in traffic, allright.

(08:16):
So now you're sitting therethinking all right, cool, but
how do I actually fix this?
But here's the idea One let'sjust acknowledge our own anger.
You're angry.
Own that shit.
Don't pretend it's not there.
Recognize it, even if it feelsuncomfortable as hell.
It's like popping that zit.

(08:37):
It hurts for a minute, but it'sway better than letting it
fester under the surface.
Two express it constructively.
You don't have to go all ragingbull on the world.
Find healthy outlets Exercise,journaling, therapy.
A men's support group could bea great one where we talk about

(09:01):
all of this stuff as men to seeone we're not alone and we gain
insights from each other to seehow we can move this repressed,
suppressed energy in healthyways.
But the key here is to expressit, don't bottle it up.
Three start owning our emotions.

(09:21):
Stop playing the victim.
Your anger doesn't control you.
You control your response.
Reclaim that power.
Stop letting it control yourlife.
Four forgiving and movingforward.
If your anger stems fromsomething you've been holding on
to for too long family issues,betrayal, hurt feelings it's

(09:44):
time to forgive.
Now this can be reallychallenging, and I even can say
challenging in for myself,because that pain that I had
gone through growing up it'shard to forgive.
Those ones that have hurt dogrowing up.
It's hard to forgive those onesthat have hurt.
However, I can't continue tokeep holding on to it because I
will continue to live in avictim consciousness from this
repressed anger, and I can dothat for 10, 20, 30 years and

(10:09):
I'll never be free because Ihave to forgive.
It's not about them, it's formyself, because for you, the
holding on to this anger reallyonly hurts ourselves.
So let it go, trust me, yourfuture self will thank you.
You know it's not only withinthe family system that we have

(10:32):
learned to repress this anger.
You know it's so interestingbecause I have a 12 year old son
and you know we always used towatch all these Pixar movies.
So that movie Inside Out, youknow, there's this scene at the
dinner table and anger wants tohave a moment to explore himself

(10:53):
.
But there's this really deepundercurrent of trying to keep
him in check.
And this is where, especiallywhen joy or the others step in
to avoid conflict, even withinthat scene, there's a message of
repress the anger.
Well, you can have the angerjust knowing how to express it

(11:17):
in a healthy way.
If we have learned from long inchildhood to repress it, it
stays undeveloped, it doesn'tknow how to express itself, it
doesn't know how to be assertiveand use it in a healthy way to
put boundaries, to protectourself, to self-advocate.

(11:37):
So here is actually the bottomline man, stop bottling your
anger.
It is a pressure cooker and thesooner or later it's going to
explode.
I see this again all over theplace in relationships.
I see this passive, aggressive.
I see this aggressive behaviorpattern.
I see compulsive behaviorpatterns known as addiction,

(12:01):
drinking, using behaving torelease this anger that is just
bottled up inside and it is justself-destructive for ourself,
for our loved ones andrelationships, for our kids, for
humanity.
We just keep doing the samething.
I once heard I believe it wasVoltar, it was.

(12:23):
History doesn't repeat itself.
I believe it was Voltar, it was.
History doesn't repeat itself.
Man does.
It is time to change and have aparadigm shift.
Let the anger move.
You know I work with a lot ofclients and one of them we're
doing a lot of deep diving intosome inner child narratives and
beliefs around growing up, beingneglected and abandoned, and

(12:47):
he'd call me.
He says I'm really angry.
You know, I want, I don't wantto be, and I'm like this is good
, this means things are finallymoving.
This is what we need to happen.
You know, transformation isreally allowing ourselves to
feel the full spectrum ofemotions.
We have been so disconnectedfrom our anger Either one.

(13:10):
We were told we weren't allowedto be.
Anger showed we weren't allowedto be anger, or we observed
people in our lives that hadanger with no boundaries.
There were just shameless waysof expressing their anger
against us, other parents,against each other, and so we
just learned how to abandon thatpart of ourself.
But we're learning how to loveall parts of ourself.

(13:33):
We don't just get to pick andchoose the parts we love and
discount the others.
We have to learn to love allparts.
All parts are welcome.
So, guys, we do not have tostay in this cycle.
Start feeling your feelings,embrace your anger and then
channel it into somethingproductive.
It is the same energy, you know,recently I've been doing a lot

(13:57):
of research on my own partlooking at the polarities of
anger, because I truly believethat anger is a misunderstood
emotion and it has a greatpropensity to act out.
So, on one side of your anger,you have this idea of death

(14:17):
extinctual, this thanatos, whereit wants to destroy life,
including our own life andothers.
And on the polar opposite side,you have this life-extinctual
side, this eros, that bringslife together, and we've seen
this through the history books,where the same energy, the same

(14:38):
anger, has used to bring peopletogether the civil rights
movement, the decolonization ofEngland from India with Gandhi.
That same anger, that sameenergy that existed but was more
life-extinctual.
Let's bring it together, ofcourse, on the polar opposite
side, we've seen where anger,and repressed anger, has

(15:00):
destroyed life the Holocaust,genocide, religious prosecution.
This is also the capacity ofanger.
So they have the polar oppositesides death instinctual and
life instinctual.
So it is the same energy andI'm more on a home front with my

(15:20):
own case studies around anger.
When I work in my coaching and Iwork on my private practice and
my groups, I see the repressionof this anger and it has the
capacity and this is where Itruly believe that suicidal
ideations come in play, wherethey want to destroy life,
including their own, because ofthis repressed anger.

(15:42):
All right, everybody.
That is today's episode of manUncaved.
We talked about the toxicity ofrepressed anger and how that
affects us as men andmasculinity.

(16:03):
It affects our relationships toothers, it affects our
relationships to ourself and webecome distant and isolated and
abandoning our own self when wedon't allow those parts to be
validated, to be heard, to beseen Again.
Men, we need to come out ofhiding.