Although I've pondered this matter for some time, the immediate impetus for this threat <VBG> arose from a situation very much involving my children. And I feel you've opened up something for me with your reflection here, Angel of Death. Thanks.
The way you've linked the fight/flight counterparts evokes a sense of something very primitive, instinctual, basic. Makes me think muladhara/purgation. And more graphically, that some sh*t has just got to be eliminated; otherwise it's a terrible poison.
I like your approach. Seems right that intentionally canceling/counteracting anger with its tremulous, threatened counterpart should allow a reasoned perspective to emerge--tempering the temper, if you will, and permitting a more holistic appreciation of circumstance and stimulus/response. Your approach accomplishes this without whitewashing or undermining the primal, instinctive sensation itself--the often-urgent need that springs forth valiantly to right wrongs and protect the innocent and defenseless. This is a passionate "red," feeling I experience strongly sometimes, and one I find blithely dismissed in many quarters as a mere "negative" emotion to be avoided.
Often, fear suffers the same rebuke as harmful and it is casually dismissed, but fear too has its purpose, and I think we are better are overcoming it without denying it than we are at dealing with rage. (What color is fear, if anger is red?)
For example, we recognize a distinction between courage and ignorance--between facing a reasonable fear nobly and being too stupid to appreciate an imminent threat, between throwing oneself on a grenade and tripping over one. Yet I don't think we have a suitable word or idea like "courageous," which could be similarly applied to well-managed rage. "Valiance," is as close as I can come at the moment, but it doesn't do justice to the primal feeling of maternal protectiveness you mention, which really captures the essence of what I'm trying to address.
I think fear has long been recognized as a necessary weakness, to be integrated thoughtfully. I think our survival depended on overcoming fear without just ignoring it. But I don't think we've had as much evolutionary impetus to evolve our anger, and it has now submerged just below the surface in our mythos and culture, unacceptable in polite company, but glorified, for example, in pop music and video games, and manifesting around the globe in underground silos full of long-range nuclear bombs! This concerns me.
I'm reminded now of the litany against fear in Frank Herbert's Dune:
"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain."
I can't recall anything I've ever read that has offered such an approach for confronting anger. How does one "face" wrath, when it is moving you to action like a shove from behind? The best we get is generally akin to someone saying, "Count to 10." Doesn't cut it for me. Just raises the systolic pressure over time.
Yet blending the two seems a possible way through, and I'm willing to try on the notion that anger can always be connected to, and seen as arising from, a perceived threat of loss. I think what you've said might offer a course of action for evolving rage without denying it--allowing self-consciousness to emerge without hamstringing the instinctive Protector of Threatened Children (who, I suppose, also protects the vulnerable inner child as well).
I'll try to remember your suggestion the next time I find myself seething and will report back on the results.
Love is the law, love under will.
D