36 pages • 1-hour read
The Dance of Anger: A Woman's Guide to Changing the Patterns of Intimate Relationships
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Chapters 7-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary & Analysis: “Who’s Responsible for What – The Trickiest Anger Question”
Lerner tackles one of the most persistent dilemmas in relationships: Sorting out responsibility for feelings, actions, and outcomes. She begins with a simple bus incident in New York City, showing how three women experienced the same driver’s outburst differently. The driver’s behavior was the same, but each woman’s response—depression, anger, nostalgia—came from her own history and perceptions. This illustrates Lerner’s central claim: People are responsible for their own feelings and actions, not for the emotional reactions of others.
Through case studies, Lerner shows how women often reverse this principle, taking responsibility for others’ emotions while denying responsibility for their own. Katy feels trapped by her father’s guilt-inducing demands; Stephanie defers to her partner Jane in decision-making, only to resent the outcome; Lisa complains about her husband’s lack of contribution to housework without changing her own overfunctioning role; Lois exhausts herself rescuing her brother; and Alicia, a divorced mother, overfunctions emotionally with her child. In each case, anger signals a blurred boundary, with the women blaming others for their own passivity or overextending themselves in trying to manage others’ feelings. Lerner insists that real change occurs only when individuals clarify their “I,” act on their beliefs, and resist the pull of old circular dances.
Lerner’s argument reflects the feminist therapeutic turn of the 1980s, when women’s overidentification with others’ needs was framed as both a social inheritance and a psychological trap. Her assumption that women disproportionately overfunction while men withdraw was grounded in traditional heterosexual, middle-class family roles. This lens may overlook different cultural, racial, or queer family systems where responsibility is distributed differently, or where structural inequities complicate personal agency. However, her insights into responsibility resonate widely: The distinction between managing oneself versus rescuing others parallels boundaries emphasized in contemporary psychology and family-systems theory.
Her case studies are less about “who is right” and more about showing the paradox of change: When one person reclaims responsibility for their own behavior, the relational system inevitably shifts. In that sense, Lerner’s message reflects the contemporary self-help book’s focus on boundaries and emotional responsibility, such as Nedra Glover Tawwab’s Set Boundaries, Find Peace (2021), which similarly argues that clarity about one’s limits and emotional responsibility is the cornerstone of relational health. Like Tawwab, Lerner underscores that the task is not to reform others but to define the self, resist overfunctioning, and allow others the dignity of managing their own feelings. The chapter’s relevance lies in teaching that anger can be a compass for self-definition, guiding individuals to act with clarity rather than collapse into blame or rescue.
Chapter Lessons
- We cannot control other people’s reactions, but we are always responsible for our own choices and behavior.
- Blame, whether directed at others or at ourselves, keeps us stuck, while clarity about responsibility makes change possible.
- Overfunctioning for others not only drains us but also prevents them from developing their own competence.
- Real growth comes from observing recurring patterns, claiming our part in them, and taking consistent action to shift our role.
Reflection Questions
- In what situations do you find yourself taking responsibility for someone else’s feelings or choices, and how might you shift that energy back to your own behavior?
- Where in your relationships do you notice an overfunctioning–underfunctioning pattern, and what concrete steps could you take to rebalance it?
Chapter 8 Summary & Analysis: “Thinking in Threes – Stepping Out of Family Triangles”
Lerner introduces the concept of family triangles, explaining how unresolved tension between two people often spills into a third relationship as a way of deflecting anxiety. Drawing on case studies and clinical examples, she demonstrates how women frequently manage anger indirectly by channeling it through children, siblings, or coworkers rather than addressing its true source.
Lerner’s opening anecdote about misdirecting grief over her father’s heart attack into anger at her children illustrates how displaced emotion can mask deeper fears of loss. From there, she explores triangles in family systems, such as Judy’s habit of pulling her children into marital frustrations with her husband, or Melissa’s scapegoating of a subordinate to avoid conflict with male superiors, and culminates with the multigenerational Kesler family, where parental conflicts are projected onto their son Billy. These narratives show how triangles stabilize relationships in the short term but perpetuate dysfunction if left unexamined.
Lerner’s larger claim is that growth requires “getting out of the middle,” (151), refusing to mediate between others, resisting the temptation to rescue or blame, and taking responsibility for one’s own stance. The chapter translates the abstract vocabulary of family systems theory into everyday dilemmas of household and workplace life. By shifting focus from persuading others to altering one’s own role in a recurring pattern, Lerner reframes anger as a guide for stepping out of the third-party detours that keep conflict alive.
This reframing is valuable, yet it also risks privatizing structural problems: Telling a junior staffer to stay out of triangles with senior men may lower tension while leaving power imbalances intact. Moreover, her method assumes a level of safety, stability, and emotional bandwidth that is unevenly available across lines of race, class, immigration status, and disability. It rests on the assumption that composure and personal effort are enough to shift outcomes, even though in many contexts only institutional reform or collective action can redress deeper inequities.
What remains enduring, however, is the tactical clarity of her approach: Trace the sequence, name your position, and change your own step first. This stance resonates with widely adopted frameworks such as Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication (2003), which emphasizes grounding responsibility in one’s own needs and language rather than projecting blame. Lerner’s distinctive contribution is to make systems thinking actionable for daily life: Not to fix others, but to stop supplying the keystone that allows the triangle and the dysfunction it sustains to remain standing.
Chapter Lessons
- Anger often gets displaced into “triangles,” where unresolved conflict between two people is redirected through a third, masking the real issue.
- Remaining in the middle of a triangle may stabilize relationships temporarily but prevents meaningful change and keeps cycles of resentment alive.
- Stepping out of triangles requires refusing to mediate, rescue, or scapegoat, and instead clarifying one’s own position directly.
- Growth comes from mapping relational patterns and altering one’s own role first, rather than attempting to reform others.
Reflection Questions
- In your own relationships, do you notice times when you become the “third party” in someone else’s conflict? What might it look like to step out of that role?
- How might shifting your focus from managing others’ tensions to clarifying your own needs change the way you approach recurring conflicts?
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