Anger gets a bad reputation.
Especially Black anger. Which gets pathologized, criminalized, and dismissed before it even finishes forming.
But anger is not the enemy.
Anger is a messenger.
What anger is actually saying:
Something that matters to me is being threatened. A boundary has been crossed. Something unjust is happening and my body knows it. I care about something enough to feel this.
That is not a problem. That is your nervous system doing exactly what it was designed to do.
The problem is not the anger. The problem is when anger has nowhere to go — when it gets suppressed until it becomes depression, or expressed in ways that hurt you or the people around you.
The research is clear: Anger suppression — especially in communities facing ongoing racism and injustice — is linked to higher rates of depression, hypertension, and physical illness. Your body cannot hold what your mind will not acknowledge.
The Practice — Three Questions:
Next time anger rises, before reacting or suppressing — pause and ask:
1. What is being threatened? (A boundary? Your dignity? Someone you love?)
2. Is this mine to address right now? (Can I act on this productively, or will acting make it worse?)
3. What does this anger need? (Movement? Expression? Rest? Action? To be witnessed?)
Anger that is heard does not have to scream.
Today’s Liberation Question:
What anger have you been carrying that you have never fully acknowledged — even to yourself? What was it trying to protect?
LEGH.org — Love Enabled Growth & Hope. For the people the system was never designed to serve.