Anger management and the chimp

Anger management and the chimp
Ever lost your temper and about an hour or so later regret your behaviour and what you said. What if I told you it was the chimp part of the mind, the limbic system that created the problem.
For simplicity, let’s divide the mind into three areas. Although not technically correct it can help the layman understand the mind better.
The frontal cortex behind the forehead is what we will call the human part of the mind. This is where the logical rational mind resides. Genetically encoded into us and not much difference between male and female. This part of the mind allows us to create human consciousness and is larger in humans than other animals. Rational and logical with the ability to feel love and compassion.
The bulk of the brain as varying roles such as face recognition and memory retention but for simplicity we will say that this is like a blanc computer drive at birth, waiting to be programmed.
The we come to the older part of the brain, the reptilian mammalian brain, the limbic system, again genetically encoded into us. We can call this the chimp part of the brain because it is pretty much the same as a chimp. It is also the part of the brain where our fear response resides. The flight or fight response. It is not a rational or logical part of the mind.
The chimp part of the brain is five times stronger and faster than the human part. Once out of the box it is hard to get it back in because it overwhelms the human part of the mind. Anger, anxiety and panic attacks come from this part of the mind. We need the chimp. If we are in the middle of the road and a car is coming toward you, the chimp reacts faster than the human mind could.
Anger is the fight response. You can’t get rid of the chimp, but you can learn to manage it by programming the computer part which is faster than the chimp, keeping the chimp in its box.