Don't argue with somebody that is already angry.

Arguments are an interesting part of the human condition. We communicate and interact with other humans on a daily basis.

Most of us to do, anyway.

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Sometimes these communications are really innocuous. Maybe you're just telling a fast food worker what you would like to eat. Maybe you're just telling a co-worker that you're doing quite well in response to his initial query.

There are quite a few conversations that operate like this. That's a good thing, because otherwise we would be embroiled in a constant state of emotion.

Emotion can certainly be a good thing. That's especially true when something good happens. Feeling happy is fantastic.

Feeling sad can even be good on occasion. It can help to clear things up for us, and make us see the world in a way that makes sense when we are feeling confused.

However, strong emotion during a conversation often turns that conversation into something less than pleasant.

These less than pleasant conversations are generally called arguments.

Outside of mathematics, arguments are usually not very useful.

There are few times when arguments actually can work in your favor. Especially when you are arguing your case, and you win that case.

Why are you a good candidate for this job?

Why should I let you take the car out tonight?

For the most part though, I would call these arguments debates. They don't hold the same kind of intensity that an in your face one on one argument might have.

Now as I said earlier, arguing is not often useful. However, when arguing with someone that is already angry, you can rest assured that you can't possibly win.... and therefore should not even begin to take part.

Earlier today one of my co-workers got angry because he felt like his share of tables was not level with the rest of us.

That is to say, he felt as though he wasn't given the same quantity or quality of tables full of customers that the rest of us got. Therefore, he felt as though he missed out on some opportunities to make money.

The rest of the servers knew that this wasn't true. He'd actually made significantly more money than the rest of us. He just was either being a bit greedy, or perhaps didn't see the full picture because of some emotion or another.

The bottom line was that no one was able to convince him that he wasn't right because he was so angry. He simply was unwilling to listen to any reason.

There was no way to change his opinion, so we all just had to wait it out. Eventually he calmed down and began to see things in a new light.

However, while we continued to argue with him during the initial rush of angry feeling, we found it impossible to have a reasonable conversation with him.

It's never a good idea to walk around your job angry. That just isn't the right place for it.

However, if you do see someone that's angry, and they're trying to argue with you.... I suggest you simply wait.

Don't argue with somebody that is already angry.