Why are we still afraid to talk about (and embrace) women’s anger?

The Chinese characters for anger, 生气 (shēng qì), relay a poignant translation of the nature of rage. Each Chinese character represents its own being, element, or sensation, and when combined, they create new and poetic verbs, feelings, and meanings: 

生 (shēng) means to “give life to,” and 气 (qì) means “a vital breath,” or “air,” which is the same 气 (qì) that you find in the beginning of 气功 (qì gōng), the popular traditional Chinese movement meditation that works with redirecting bodily energy and breath. When conjoined in a dance of new meaning, not only do these two Chinese characters 生气 (shēng qì) mean anger, but they also literally translate to the poetic phrase “to give life to a vital breath.” 

This definition has helped me see that anger holds a sacred life of its own. We are responsible for bringing anger to life and life to anger. Rage is a sacred and necessary energy that is part of our being and part of Earth.

Anger is often seen as the villain. It sprouts from seedlings of fear and is frequently born of an urgency to protect and dignify what you love. It works with many different emotions and manifests expressions such as resistance, action, revenge, violence, and protection. Anger lives in a pulsing relationship with other complicated feelings, such as sorrow, shame, and insecurity. Because it can be such an overwhelming and powerful feeling, it is helpful to pay attention to what other emotions it is working with; otherwise, anger can become impulsive and dominating. When we think of anger as a vital breath, we must think about the source of its power and what we express in each sacred exhale.

Can we consider anger a loving force? You are rageful, you are fearful, you are protective, and you are also loving. All of these truths coexist. At the core of love-based anger, we are fighting for our sacred survival. Love encourages us not only to protect ourselves but also to honour our being and all that we are in a relationship with. When we cannot acknowledge the love that holds our vital breath, we are overtaken by a fear-based rage that drives us toward feelings of resentment, shame, and vengeance. 

During a discussion for the podcast For the Wild, Lama Rod Owens said, “Anger is the bodyguard of our woundedness.” Anger, like numbness, is another sacred protector of our survival. It is a loving act to protect yourself, a loving act to resist harm, and a loving act to allow yourself the sacred breath of anger. Everything brings us back to love.

There is no emotion I would ever tell you not to feel. I do not write to encourage you to overcome any emotion. Instead, I encourage you to sit with each emotion. Perhaps even go deeper. There are so many short-term and buyable solutions to anger, anxiety, and depression that encourage us not to feel or to “transcend” negative thoughts. This ostracizes us from our own feelings and from people who are experiencing heavy emotions. 

When somebody feels deeply hurt or betrayed, it can be a harmful response to tell that person to immediately “overcome” or “be above” their painful feelings. Each feeling we hold is the natural conjuring of an energy that exists within us, though that feeling is not all of us. Emotion is energy, and energy is a vital part of our life force.

I like to imagine every emotion as a vital sacred protector, an ancestor embodied as a feeling, telling me in their own language what I have been taught to overlook. They all have homes within us. Anger is the sacred breath that we must allow ourselves to release, for it holds a vital truth about what truly matters most to us. Anger is an invitation to connect deeper with yourself and to uncover what you are trying to protect. 

Are you trying to protect something that your ego is attempting to control, or are you trying to protect your sacred beingness and all that you love? What are you willing to let go of, and what are you willing to fight for? Anger is the powerful force that allows us to bring violent systems of harm to their destruction while also giving breath to loving possibilities of creation. Allow yourself to breathe.

Condensed and extracted from Be Not Afraid of Love: Lessons on Fear, Intimacy, and Connection by Mimi Zhu (Hardie Grant).