"You made a commitment to me that this facility would be up and operating at the end of this month. Those were your words. You need to accomplish that commitment. I have made commitments based upon your commitment. Are we connecting?" This was my building rage side of a conversation with a vendor in my offices who was two weeks behind on an install that was business-critical for my company at the time. My sister says there is no reason to think that I am really angry if I am yelling. My clear-the-room anger shows up when my voice is very low and very slow. I think that it comes from my mother. She didn't believe in yelling. It wasn't because she never got angry, she did. She did not want anyone to think that they had pushed her past her ability to control her emotions, so even if her eyes flashed and her tone was razor-blade sharp, she never yelled. For some reason, letting frustration blast through anger thresholds into true rage provides a release. I'm not talking Hulk rage, ("Me Hulk, Me Smash Things). I am not violent or squeal tires as I leave a drive way or even throw dishes. My rage is verbal. I either verbalize about an issue, a company, a person, or in the very rarest of occasions at someone. The last one is the most dangerous of all. I have too many skills in this area. Throw some gasoline on my rage fire and I will just fry someone. I am not proud of that, so I try to avoid directing the rage riot at someone directly. Tony Soprano is an example of someone who seems only capable of the "at someone" approach and at the end of his rage, the person is usually dead. Along the way, I learned that most anger is caused by fear. I know I stole this from someone, but I cannot remember who, so it's mine for now. My big fear is not having control. Probably a more accurate statement would be that I cannot control the commitments I have made. I become afraid that what I have promised or believe I am supposed to do will not happen and that makes me angry. When I feel like this ability to deliver on my promises is blocked by someone or something intentionally or indifferently, then I become enraged. This is when I turn on the oven in my soul, open the refrigerator in my mind and decide what we are going to cook for dinner. Rage energizes my desire to wage war. Rage should be blinding hot, just like revenge is a dish best served cold. My rage verbalizes first hot and then plans for pain and retribution come quickly to mind. I then select based upon speed, degree of success and the potential I can keep my fingerprints off of the blade. The answer might be as easy as a phone call or much more complicated. It's odd. Hungry children, homelessness, disease, war, social injustice and many other categories of atrocity make me deeply sad, not angry. In my mid-forties I started to notice something; the rage aftertaste. If rage tasted like expensive brandy, then the aftertaste was like the tongues taste when you wake with a tequila hangover. Regret kills the joys of rage. It takes the flavor from the meal. I'm not certain which person I had made cry during a presentation or what CEO I had flambeed because of the ineffectiveness of his sales organization or even the most recent yard service who had not met expectations. What I do know was that I felt like a jerk. I had to honestly apologize. This is differently than strategically apologize, which I believe is an appropriate maneuver under the stipulations of modern diplomacy. I stopped enjoying rage. This led to the downward slide to not enjoying anger as much, although I do have anger and I still believe that some of it is justified. There are people in this world who never get angry. They make me nervous. My wife is as positive and chipper a person as anyone I have met. To me, she is light. However, early enough in our courtship when I was still curious about, "will this last?" she got spitting angry about something and I knew, "This is the one for me!" I hit about fifty and had a heart-attack to prove something. When you have a heart-attack, it is typical, I guess, for you to go through a period of some depression. I started on a mood-modulator, (code I think for anti-depressant). This means that I have lost all my rage taste buds. I kind of miss them. There was a flavor to rage. Even though it might be like the flavor of a cigarette to a smoker, I still liked to light one up every once in a while. No e-cigarette is going to replace it. There isn't a "Rage Range" that you can book a tee time at like golf. I guess, for me, I can't go back. Our POTUS can rage every day. I have lost the energy and targets for it. I will confess, however, that when I wasn't counting the ashes or the tequila-tasting-tongue hangovers, I liked the fire and brandy flavors enough to keep burning and drinking.