If you’ve been friends with someone for any length of time, you know that they aren’t perfect, and they know the same about you. People, including our friends, can say and do things that stir up hurt, and things that are insensitive or disrespectful.

If you’ve been friends with someone for a long while, you’ve likely had moments when you’ve angered your friend, and they have angered you. What should you do when you feel angry with your friend? This article will help you navigate how to deal constructively with your anger so that you strengthen your friendship.

Why We Get Angry

To begin with, it’s important to understand why we get angry. It’s possible to have an unhealthy relationship with anger thinking that getting angry is inherently wrong or problematic. Anger, however, is a normal, healthy emotion that’s useful for our survival and the maintenance of boundaries in our relationships. When we understand the role that anger plays in our lives, we can appreciate it and allow it to play that role.

Typically, you don’t have to search high and low to find out what it is that’s making you angry because anger is often an immediate response to a situation. Sometimes, you can get angry and spend the whole day angry without knowing exactly why. On later reflection, you may realize that you’re feeling angry because of something as simple as the look that a stranger gave you when you were grabbing your morning coffee. At the moment you were able to let it go, but it got under your skin, affecting you later.

The Importance of Boundaries

Boundaries are necessary for healthy relationships. We need boundaries because we are individuals with unique, personal needs. The erasure of boundaries between two people means that one of them likely isn’t getting their needs met, causing a disservice to one’s physical, emotional, and mental health. We need boundaries because they help us know who we are and how to love one another well.

When our boundaries are violated and when our safety is threatened the natural response is to get angry. Feeling angry is your body and mind’s way of saying that something in your space isn’t right and it needs your attention. These things range from life-threatening issues such as being run off the road by a dangerous driver, to daily irritations such as the snide comment your classmate made. It could be that your boss let your colleague slide, again, or the way your kids trashed the house just an hour after you’d cleaned it.

With friends, you can get angry because of things such as trust being violated or feeling like you’re being taken advantage of or for granted. Allowing a person into your space is a very vulnerable thing to do. When a friend doesn’t respect your boundaries, it can hurt and stoke anger even more because you have higher expectations of those you’re close to than you do with total strangers.

Resolving Anger Between Friends

Friends will get angry with one another. In the course of your friendship, at one time or another one of you will say something insensitive or do something that’s out of bounds. It’s important to be able to resolve this anger constructively, particularly if you cherish your friendship and want it to continue.

This is not to say you should sweep your feelings away, but that there is a way of dealing with those feelings that can lead to a mutually workable solution. Some ways you can begin resolving your anger with your friend include:

Recognize your anger, but don’t allow it to lead you

If you feel angry, recognize the emotion for what it is, and acknowledge your feelings. Neither you nor your friend are served by pretending that you aren’t feeling angry for their insensitive act or statement. If you are feeling angry, it’s likely for good reason, because a boundary has been violated. You need to be honest with yourself about how you feel, and you need to deal honestly with your friend as well.

Anger is a powerful emotion, and it can guide your actions and color your thoughts and perceptions. While it’s important to recognize when you’re feeling angry, it’s equally important to not allow anger to take over.

If you let anger dictate your responses, you may say or do things that will jeopardize your friendship. As tempting as it may be, don’t post things about your friend online, or gossip about them to other people. It may feel good in ate moment, but it can destroy a good friendship and the chance to restore things.

Is your anger justified?

Anger is a natural, healthy emotion, and we need to pay attention to it. However, it is also true that as flawed human beings, we get angry about all sorts of things. This can even be things we shouldn’t be getting angry about. Your friend might have spoken lovingly and truthfully about the fact that you have codependent tendencies, for instance, or that you have an unhealthy relationship with your work. You can get angry, and that anger is very real, but ask yourself if that anger is justified.

As the Lord asked his prophet named Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry?” (Jonah 4:4, NIV). Not all anger is righteous anger that we need to indulge in. Do the hard work of figuring out if it is right for you to be angry at your friend, or if your anger is simply masking your insecurities and issues.

Exercise empathy.

If your friend said or did something silly, exercising empathy means imagining yourself in their shoes. Maybe they were having a bad day, perhaps they were acting out of anger themselves, and so on. Recognize that just as you mess up, your friend is just as human as you are. They need understanding just like everyone else does.

Communicate your feelings well.

Talk to your friend about your feelings. This seems simple enough, but often people can assume that their friends should know what they’ve done, or they can decide to swallow the anger and say nothing. However, if you say nothing, that anger may simply eat you up inside, and it can destroy your relationship by eroding trust and intimacy.

Also, if the same thing happens again, the anger will be fortified, and you might not be as willing to forgive or show them empathy. Communicating well means using your effective listening skills such as using “I” language, paying attention to non-verbal language cues, and asking questions to clarify. Doing this will foster a stronger friendship.

Be willing to compromise.

As you and your friend work through what happened, your respective feelings about it, and what you both think should happen going forward, approach the situation with openness and the willingness to compromise. Compromise may take a different shape depending on your situation.

Compromise may include elements such as revising your expectations of your friendship, redrawing boundaries to accommodate your new understanding, and apologizing for your part in things.

Extend forgiveness.

Whether things end well or poorly, extending forgiveness will work well for you to prevent you from becoming resentful of your friend. If your anger is unresolved or you allow yourself to wallow in it, it can turn into resentment. Resentment can hurt all of your relationships, not just the relationship that started it.

The main way to prevent resentment and anger is to forgive the person who offended you, releasing yourself from the burden and desire to get even with them.

Be grateful for your friend.

Gratitude is a great way to deal with your anger and any lingering resentment toward your friend. You and your friend can work through your issues together and reaffirm your connection.

If you decide that your friendship will no longer continue, that’s sad but okay. Either way, a great way to move forward is to be grateful for your friend and for the friendship you had. There is a reason the two of you became friends and being grateful for the moments you shared is a wonderful note on which to end things or carry on to your next adventures.

Getting Help to Work Through Anger and Relationship Issues

Relationships can be difficult, and they can have complicated and messy emotions such as anger. Whatever may have caused the anger between you and your friend, it’s possible to work through it and emerge on the other side.

If your friend was your closest confidant, you may not have someone else with whom to safely unpack your emotions. You can get help to work through your anger toward your friend by talking with a counselor.

A counselor will walk with you as you consider and better understand your anger toward your friend, working through its origins and consequences. Your counselor will create a safe space and be your sounding board, hearing your concerns and helping you develop skills such as problem-solving and conflict resolution. These tools are useful for all kinds of relationships.

If your friendship has been undermined by whatever caused the anger, that loss is something your counselor can support you through. Anger can be an ugly emotion, and your counselor can help you deal with your anger in an appropriate and healthy manner that promotes the flourishing of your relationships. Reach out to a counselor today and get help to work through your anger toward your friend.