I think I understand what youre saying. Its like a therapist telling his client to hit a pillow rather than repress the emotion.
That typically is to get you to acknowledge your anger rather than holding it back. It creates a "safe place" to let all that powerful emotion out that has been built up over the years of stuffing it down, creating a pool of rage. The goal however would be to then learn to deal with the anger issues as the come up in productive ways so you don't end up hurting yourself and your relationships in the future by letting it build up like that. The goal would be to allow yourself to recognize your anger at the time it happens, and find an appropriate way to deal with the problem at the time. That way, you're actually manging your behaviors as you expeirence anger, controlling how you act in response to it.
The bad part is when we let anger let us lose control. Once you have control of yourself with the emotion anger, then it can in fact be a powerful ally, helping you and everyone else as you stay healthy. Anger can lead to positive changes and not allowing things to build up.
If it were healthy, there would be no need to address it.
It's neither a healthy emotion or an unhealthy one. What we do with it is what is either healthy or unhealthy. I'm stating that trying to deny it to yourself is unhealthy because it leads one into things like depression, or it's ugly step-sister, passive-aggressiveness. Anger can be your friend too, if you learn how to manage the things you do with it. Viewing it in itself as the enemy, is to hate and deny part of the reality of who we are. And that, in my opinion, is what will send us into things like depression. We have to learn to love ourselves, and acknowledging and befriending our own areas we've shunted off into the corners to hide them away from us, is the beginning of genuinely living life free. It's the beginning of a true spirituality, in fact.
I can see that. Biblically (quick note) even bad thoughts are sinful. So, if I went off of that it wouls be a combination. Although I dont believe In the bible, I can see why that is true based on how I was raised.
There is indeed some truth in these things. However the thoughts are not sin in themselves, but our giving in and indulging into dark and negative patterns of thoughts is what leads us away into darkness. This much is very, very true. Negative thinking creates negative emotions in response to them, which emotion then leads us to believe in the thoughts because we are now experiencing them and experiences are real. We have to address our thought patterns and our habits with them, to be made consciously aware of them and recognize them and choose alternative paths to go when we see them happening. It's where we go with them that's sinful or not. Anything that leads us into depression is in fact us "falling short of the mark".
But there is no judgment, just seeing the truth of it in ourselves and getting a handle on our own thoughts. To quote the Buddha here, "More than those who hate you, more than all your enemies, an undisciplined mind does greater harm." Our own negativity patterns are a form of self-abuse we indulge in out of a form of self-loathing, greater than any enemy outside ourselves could do.
To reiterate, these are skills that you have to learn, but to come from where you are to there will take safe places to work on those things. The goal is not to just let it all fly out anywhere and everywhere smashing things and throwing heavy objects at people.
The goal is to let your anger help keep you from harm, physically, emotionally, psychologically, relationally, and spiritually.