Anger as Shadow and LIGHT

Anger is a shadowy energy in our culture, especially for women. There is very little encouragement for women in our culture to be angry and to use this strength as empowerment. Anger's gift is strength. When we deny our anger, it goes into shadow and becomes a resentment, rage or we act it out passive-aggressively. We are so conditioned to be "nice" that this energy of anger is often acted out on ourselves and others. It is a misuse of this emotion. We must eat, shop, caretake, judge, blame, gossip, compulsively clean, etc., to keep the emotion of anger at bay. This must be unlearned and then anger must be embraced. Anger offers the gift of strength and understanding that our boundaries or someone elses' are being violated and action is called for.

As women, one of the greatest and most potent interventions on our own shadows around anger, addiction and any other way we are allowing ourselves to be victimized by ourselves or others is through embracing our healthy ANGER. When we use our anger with intention, care and wisdom, it becomes a force for good.

We begin to trust our intuition, know that this emotion is providing us important information and begin to set the boundaries that are called for in our lives. Healthy anger also points us in the direction of having the communications we need to have with others and we learn to take action for self-care and self-love. This honesty with ourselves and intentional use of the energy that anger provides us creates authentic connections with others. We can not have authentic connections with ourselves or others without the ability to feel and access healthy anger.

While it may go against many if not all of the conditioning in families, churches, educational institutions and social mores that we've learned, it is a good and necessary practice that we begin to invite healthy anger into our spiritual and psychological toolbox. As we do and use it with wisdom and discernment, our relationships with self and others begin to deepen into authentic connections that inspire and empower mutually.

So with support, practice and consistency, we can begin to embrace and honor our anger. We say, "anger is my friend" and we repeat as needed.

With love,

Sally