No Stupid Questions

Removing / migitating sources of stress and anxiety. I was known at work for my regular expression of anger, and if it wasn't that it was sarcasm. Had a 3 month rehab after crashing really hard, and the "observers view" of my life at home made me see what had to change. Similar progress could be made with a good therapist, will take more time tho.

Since no one had actually answered you: In roughly 30 minutes increments.

Do you wear a watch? I find it helps massively. Make a point of looking at it. I don't know what your work situation is, or living situation, but if you feel the wire trip, time it. Go and take a thirty minute break elsewhere. Toilet, conference room, cupboard, who cares just as long as you can be by yourself, and not be bothered. Write a journal, note why you got pissed off. Simmering anger can sabotage easily because it is basically you against you. Like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies. It can also be addictive. Note that too.

Thirty minutes I guarantee it the anger will have gone.
Plan your day so when you deal with them, you get it out of the way nice and early. You don' t need them dropping a load of shit in your lap at 4pm on a friday. Know when to be gone, if you know what I mean.

Anti-anxiety meds.

Anxiety isn't the cause of all people's short fuse, but it was for me.

And to be clear, I wasn't really "anger" issues as in "blowing up at other people". You don't work retail long before you learn how to put on a happy face. It was more "anger issues" that I would just seethe to myself at all the stupidity around me, completely unable to let even the littlest shit go.

Driving was the worst. I was an asshole as a driver. My entire time travelling to work would often be filled with a constant litany of yelling and swearing to myself, knowing full well that the other person can't hear me.

Flipped out over stupid shit. Hurt someone i loved. Decided to be better. Took 10 years beyond that, but there was progress that whole time.

Finding people annoying isn't the problem, people will always be annoying. If you find yourself exploding over small stuff, it means your mental resources for suppressing and tolerating such things have been depleted. Changing how you think of people can help, but I would examine your lifestyle as a whole and figure out why you aren't able to maintain said mental resources. You may not be resting enough, you may have other problems. It might be hard at first if you've not explored this stuff before, but it's well worth it in the long run.

Don't dismiss physical problems as a possibility either. Something that was surprising to me was blood pressure, apparently it was causing me to fly off the handle at times. Literally all it took was some minor weight loss and eating musli, and suddenly I'm fine again.

Anger is our inability to understand or accept the true nature of things.

Post marking this thread for edit with more details later, after I've had a nap.

You could learn to accept it for what it is, as it's not yours to spend energy on it.

People are flawed, you are people too. Equally flawed, just differently.

Maybe work on that inflated ego first.

I realized the hard truth is you don't get mad at shit you don't care about. And suddenly a lot of shit I got mad at felt really fucking stupid.

I also learned to take a deep breath before I act in anger, and it often calms me down enough to find a better solution.

I am not a better human being, but I'm combating my irritability one cause at a time. Firstly, treating physical conditions that cause irritability (as much as money has let me): hormonal issues, sleeping issues, etc. Secondly, addressing psychological and psychiatric problems (I had to learn a lot of these topics because I wasn't able to afford specialists all the time and it was an interest of mine anyway). Finally, fixing external or environmental causes, e.g. working on changing toxic relationships.

It is still a work in progress, but my life is getting calmer and calmer as I am ticking the boxes in that list. At some point, you get to a place where you can search for your own answers, existentially speaking, and that also helps. Here I mean exploring philosophy and your own ideas; your feelings, your passions, etc.

Be patient. Be compassionate with yourself (and others).

Care less

I started therapy and my therapist helped me see that my fucked-up childhood left me with lots of triggers, which we examined. Understanding those triggers reduced their power. I also now understand I can leave stressful situations before I blow up. I don't have to constantly mask.

So, therapy. It's awesome. If your first therapist isn't a good fit it's ok to find another one.

When I get angry at someone online, I mute or block them

When I get angry at someone IRL, I walk away and put physical distance between us.

If it happens often and I cannot put distance between myself and the other person, then I take a few days to think about what made me angry and I draft a letter explaining my feelings and what are my needs to prevent it from occurring again. If it keeps happening, then I make changes to my life so I dont have to see them.

i bought a laptop that's made out of metal so that i can smash it all i want and it's still broken

Honestly, watching and thinking about the Pixar movie Inside Out helped me understand my anger a lot better. In the movie, Anger is kind of a joke character. But there's a line when he's introduced where Joy says "Anger wants things to be fair."

I think a lot about how when I'm angry, most of the time there's some imbalance that I want balanced, and I'm looking to inflict pain, either physical or emotional, in order to balance it out. The vast majority of times, that's not actually a winning strategy, either in terms of long or short term goals.

It doesn't always work, but trying to think in terms of what I actually want, why I want it, and what impulses and aims are leading to my feelings, has been a lot of help to not feeling so much like I'm being helplessly driven by my anger.

Sometimes it helps to feel bad for someone instead of being angry at them. I think of Gandalf’s quote from LOTR:

“Frodo: 'It's a pity Bilbo didn't kill Gollum when he had the chance.'
Gandalf: 'Pity? It's pity that stayed Bilbo's hand. Many that live deserve death. Some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment.”

Started thinking about if something will affect me in 8 minutes, 8 hours, or 8 days. Now i only get mad at things that will affect me for 8 days. My anger is from combat so it’s unreasonable which makes it easier to ignore now that i’m aware of it.

Stopped being poor. My family instilling a poverty mindset meant stuff breaking led to many negative emotions. If you stop caring about how much that can ruin your financial situation, that's a massive reduction in stress and anger.

Notice when your teeth are clenching and muscles tensing, then consciously relax all your muscles.

It doesn't help with the cause of the anger, but it really reduces the need to retaliate.

Drop caffeine. Seriously, that took me from reacting like the hulk to just getting flushed in the face (in most cases...I still flew off the handle sometimes, but like less than 20% compared to before). Next step that helped then was getting a non stimulant medication for ADHD, but that may not be needed for you.