How to put the urge to hurl on hold

Tempted to hurl your phone? Taking a break from it might be a useful idea. Emanuel Maidenberg, director of the UCLA Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Clinic, suggests waiting a few minutes before dealing with an upsetting text: “When you feel that you’re about to lose it, timeouts are very helpful.”

If you’re frequently tempted to give your cellphone the heave-ho, it may be a sign that you’re too passive about everything else in your life. Suppressed feelings can build up, eventually causing you to overreact.

When that becomes a pattern, Maidenberg says, assertiveness training, or anger-management, could be worthwhile: “If you engage in this behavior, it’s a signal that you may want to learn a new skill of being assertive throughout the day and in your interactions with other people. It may help you to not get to that boiling point.”

—Emily Dwass