ANGER IS A LOVING RESPONSE
TO INJUSTICE
-- Lawrence Plumlee
The power of anger is difficult to face. We identify anger with violence, and
women have been conditioned to feel that our anger is wrong and unacceptable.
yet anger is a manifestation of the life force. It is a survival emotion, a
warning signal that something in our environment is threatening. Danger
triggers a physical, psychic, and emotional response that mobilizes our energy
to change the situation. Being human, we respond to verbal and emotional
attacks as threats, which arouse anger. But when we cannot admit our own
anger, instead of recognizing the threat in the environment, we experience
ourselves as wrong. Instead of flowing outward to change the environment, our
energy becomes locked into internal efforts at repression and control.
The Goddess liberates the energy of our anger. It is seen as sacred, and its
power is. purified. Like a forest fire in undisturbed wilderness, it sweeps
away the underbrush so that the seedlings of our creativity can receive the
nourishing sunlight. We control our actions; we do not attempt to control our
feelings. Anger becomes a connecting force that spurs honest confrontations
and communications with others.
--Starhawk
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