The High Price of Anger

ARE you prone to anger, ready to explode with rage at the least provocation? Do you simmer and fume for days, nursing a deeply offended spirit whenever someone slights you? If so, you may be doing more than alienating those around you; you may be killing yourself with anger.

Can anger really be lethal? According to a recent report from The New York Times News Service, the possibility is not at all farfetched. The report asserts, for instance, that “chronic anger is so damaging to the body that it ranks with, or even exceeds, cigarette smoking, obesity and a high-fat diet as a powerful risk factor for early death.”

As evidence, the report cites several scientific studies. In one, some 25-year-old university students were given personality tests to gauge the level of hostility they felt in various everyday situations. Researchers followed up on these students 25 years later. Those who were rated the least hostile had a very low death rate. Only 4 percent of them had died by age 50. But the most hostile did not fare as well​—20 percent had died! Another study found that those who were rated the most hostile in youth tended to have much higher levels of harmful cholesterol later in life, putting them at greater risk of heart disease.

What about those who simmer with repressed rage instead of finding positive ways to deal with their problems? Dr. Mara Julius, an epidemiologist at the University of Michigan, surveyed a group of women over an 18-year period. She found that those who showed obvious signs of chronic, suppressed hostility had a death rate some three times higher than those who did not harbor such anger. She concludes: “For many women, constant suppressed anger seems to be a stronger risk factor for early mortality than smoking.”

Thousands of years before any such scientific studies, the Bible warned against anger. “Let the sun not set with you in a provoked state,” says one verse. (Ephesians 4:26) “Let anger alone and leave rage,” counsels another. (Psalm 37:8) Even more remarkably, the Bible drew a connection between our emotional state and our physical health when it asserted: “A calm heart is the life of the fleshly organism.”​—Proverbs 14:30.

[Picture on page 14]

The undertaker sees an angry man and gleefully anticipates a “customer”