What if anger was… love?
I wonder today.
Anger is the feeling I keep meeting amidst my constant quest for the true sense of love; so there has to be a connection. I chose a yoga practice built in celebration of love this morning, and the more my heart opened, the more the anger could flow out of my system, out of my traumatized pelvis, out of my hips flexor. Out of me. That makes no sense to me... Yet, this is my present reality. So there HAS to be a link. A way to reconcile anger with love. A way for it all to make sense! A way back to love… Other than denial.
So yes, what if anger was love? Because now that I think about it, what could be more unloving than to stay calm in front of abuse, of torture, of betrayal and of a screaming child? How is it okay to let the abuser get away with what the victim will have to carry her entire life, just because we… because I tend to mistake unconditional love with unconditional acceptance?
What if anger was an act of love; not an attack? If transmuted the right way I mean. Into words. Into a story. A story we can share and rewrite together. Into aligned actions. Actions we can take as a resilient human being, trying their best to find a way out of a scary narrative; and then as the human community we were sent down here to create… Into solutions, and into hope. INTO love.
What if the problem had never been anger in the first place, but always and only what we do in its name… What we do when we mistake anger for the fear it so skillfully hides from our awareness and broken hearts. What if anger was, or at least could be, love?
What if anger was not what needs to be studied, but only a signpost. A flag under which we have to dig and search for a fear that needs love to subside. Or even more importantly for love that needs love to survive.
What if anger was not the problem I’ve been raised to believe it is and therefore deny, flee, tame, sugaerase or turn into self-deprecating jokes? What if anger was a super power that can be harnessed and alchemized into an unstoppable source of creativity, imagination and will to contribute, to dig deeper into our souls, our hearts and our minds, to find a way in to the well of love we are all connected to deep inside… and a way out for this very love to overflow and take over the world?
What if anger was really love? What would you do differently in your life then? What would you feel differently about everything and about everyone? What if anger could be the spark we need, for the fireworks we so desperately yearn for and look for in all the wrong places; instead of the start of another murderous fire one mistakenly unleashes on all that surrounds them, thinking it will solve problems it only magnifies, reveals or fabricates. What if anger was like a lion? A magnificent creature that could very well destroy us in a second, yes… but also a symbol of strength, of beauty, of freedom.
What if anger was love… The love we feel for our inner child, and all that that tiny child had to endure with no armor, no protecting spells, no fairy godmother… nor perspective. The love we feel for each other, but do not know how to express. The love that we are so afraid to lose that we end up sacrificing on the altar of material security, and in the reach for power over what we misguidedly think will shield us from impermanence and uncertainty. The love that was meant to guide us home… and that we end up running away from, thinking it is our duty, and our path from birth to adulthood and responsibility. What if anger was indeed our way back to love?
Let that sink in for a moment… Let us all think about it all and see how things change, how things transform and where it leads us. Running away from my anger only got me further and further away from my body and experience. Could running toward it be the solution? Is it how a dying phoenix can turn into ashes… and finally get its chance at rebirth? Is it how the metamorphosis starts, how the past disappears and how it all begins again? Is it the way out of fear and into love?
Is anger… love?
Let’s find out.