I have worked too hard to be angry

Originally Written September 9, 2021

I have worked too hard to be angry.

Let me explain. I do not mean I have come this far and being angry is the problem. I am actually proud of my newfound ability and allowance to feel anger.

For years I was complacent and quiet, always learning but never associating it with feelings. Not strong ones, anyway. Disappointment is a feeling, a natural feeling, but should that be the feeling I feel when reading about wars? Mere disappointment at the actions of man and men, a small whine at their horrific crimes?

I have fought hard to allow myself to feel badly.

I had long thought if I was not happy, I could not share it. I was to be happy, and perfect, and bright, if I was saddened or spiteful or dull or fueled firey fury, who would accept it? How would other people see me? Because I have seen people who make those negative feelings their entire being for seemingly small reasons, and I could not stoop to them unless I was reaching down to lift up.

But one day I realized: If I am sad that my friends don’t value themselves, that is different to being sad that I can’t buy a dress I wanted. Both are real and should be felt, but one is more severe; one holds more value to me, and it is not the dress.

If I am spiteful of a rival’s success, it is different if I harness it. If the sparks of my envy are used to forge a better circumstance for myself, channeled into a fire on which I smelt my own success, it cannot be too terrible.

If I am dull from time to time, too burnt out to be bright, is that shameful? That I try so hard to be a beacon but need to take time to change the bulb. Maintenance and care is not shameful, it is work and work to be proud of.

If I am filled with unending hate and unfiltered rage at the world around me, what is it at? Is it at the man who entreats to women he is Nice and thus good until he calls her a prudish slut? Or at the delivery guy who gave me a pizza not made how I wanted it. Is that not the fault of the chef? Is that the fault of the person who took my order? I know not, but it is not the delivery man.

If I feel anger I check with myself to see it is justified, I step back and see if they deserve to be the focus of a torrential uproar of wrath. Because that is how I feel. I feel deep, I feel complex, I feel so fully that I used to be afraid to let my feelings be loud.

And if my anger is from children in cages, seeing someone being bullied, Muslims forced into concentration camps, rich blaming the poor and profiting off of it, or those in power not using it for those who need it? I almost pity the soulless creature responsible for it. My rage will blaze as bright as their funeral pyre, and I will carry this torch to their corrupt foundational systems and my eyes will reflect the fire burning their misdeeds to the ground. And if Their crimes go uncriticized by man I will be Prometheus bringing the gift of justified fury and pass my torch to new trailblazers until the world is burnt down to start anew. Like the Phoenix humanity will rise from the ashes of our torturers and we will once again have the freedom to fly in smogless skies.