Rage, Grieve, Love

Calling upon all circles of healing for these times

Grief abounds.

Rage abounds.

Listen and bear witness.

With-ness.

That’s how we get to love.

My heart feels so heavy and full, open and broken, all at the same time. The last many weeks — both before and since the large-scale violence began in Gaza and Israel — have been laden with supporting folks in their grief and making space for my own. I feel and hear the anger at the injustices, the frustration and the helplessness, for breakdowns in our own lives and breakdowns in the wider world. And, underneath the rage and grief, I hear desires for different, wiser, softer, more complexity-honoring paths forward for ourselves, for our relationships, for the world. In the midst of it, I am trying to remember to feel joy and deepen with gratitude. Trying to tune into the hope and the light and promise of possibility. For I know I only rage and grieve that which I love and care about. Some days it feels easier than others.

Today is not one of those days.

Today, the endless Why? is pounding in my head. Why can’t people heal their shit? Why do those same people have access to tools of violence and destruction? Why can’t they do better? It’s been thousands of years of mindfulness and compassion, hundreds of prophets of peace, millions of teachings of love and justice… Aren’t we as humanity past the eye-for-an-eye-vengeance thing yet? Don’t we get that it makes the whole world blind — because when we lose our eyes, we stop being able to see ourselves and each other wholly? Why aren’t we clear that when there is hurt, what the heart longs for is healing and understanding? Why haven’t we at least learned not to allow guns in the hands of those not mentally, psychically and spiritually fit to take responsibility for the suffering they cause? Why do traumatized people operating within traumatizing systems have so much power? I want to scream from the rooftops.

In one of my favorite sci-fi series, Red Rising, a character says, “Death begets death begets death,” in reference to the insatiable drive for avenging one person/family/tribe’s pain, that leads to an endless cycle of suffering and loss of life. For me, these days, it feels like, “Trauma begets trauma begets trauma” (aka, Hurt people hurt people and create systems that hurt people.) Devastating, heartbreaking, and it all feels so pointless. I want everyone off this hamster wheel now. I want the ceasefire in the war zones, and I want the ceasefire in how we hurt each other with our judgements and and how we hurt ourselves with inner critic attacks. All those small unhealed ripples coalesce into systemic tidal waves, and Palestinians and Israelis and Ukranians and Russians and Iranians and Haitians and Sudanese, and many, many more, are paying the bill with their lives.

I am also hurting because I feel we know how to change this. On a recent call, a friend shared that we have all the technology for healing across conflicts, across identity divides, across experiences of hurt and harm. We have seen the healing happen and understand how the process works — in restorative circles, in Jams, and in many other spaces. We know it relies on co-creating an intentional container, on slowing down, on speaking our vulnerable truths from our heart, on listening with presence and not judgement, on allowing ourselves to be moved by what we hear, on trusting that our interconnections make possible new paths. We have experienced the miraculous transformations that result from these simple yet profound practices.

So, where are they now on the large-scale? Is it a matter of resources? A problem of political (un)will? What stands in the way of stopping the violence, ending the cycles of suffering, and growing more healing in our world?

I can turn to political analysis, of course, and yet that doesn’t serve the transformation I seek. That’s just a way for me to escape the pain I feel. I don’t want to participate in the panic zone upon panic zone upon panic zone — no longer listening and only operating from fight or flight, dividing the world into ‘us’ and ‘them’, ranking and measuring pain and oppression to decide who deserves more of it or less of it. Everyone loses in that game.

So, I am slowing down to get out of my head and back into my heart and feel what I can offer from where I stand. I am trying to stay connected to my faith and trust, and bring the gifts that I can to this moment. I write today in this effort, with my humble wish to be of service in painful times.

Just to be clear, I am not talking to those in the thick of it; they are just trying to survive right now. My heart is with them, all those deeply suffering and struggling to simply stay alive, and I pray all of those working on solutions will find ways to stop the violence soon.

I’m talking about what happens in the meantime. I’m speaking to myself and the rest of us out here. Can we open ourselves to make space to listen to each other, to grieve and release, to meet the pain with compassion and love? Can we take a pause when the media or a leader points to vengeance and more division and ask them (and ourselves), Is that what you really want? More suffering for others? How can that be any kind of a solution? Can we invite healing, repair, and transforming the systems that got us here in the first place? Can we call upon the imagination, creativity and collaboration to make healthier, whole-r, more just and sane paths together?

In this vein, I offer Rage, Grieve, Love. I want to invite in the conversations, relationships, circles and communities that can hold all of the dimensions, all of the truths, because they trust that on the other side of rage is grief, and on the other side of both is love.

(Side note: After the beautiful peyote ceremony I just experienced in the Native American church this weekend, collective prayer feels on point, too — as does breaking bread together, feeding ourselves and each other, with nourishing goodness. So, think of this piece as an add-on to Elizabeth’s Gilbert’s mantra of Eat, Pray, Love — not as a replacement of it.)

Rage. (You’ve already heard some of mine.) I want to invite space for anger, to speak the frustration, the annoyance, even the feelings of revenge. The rage comes from the wounds — inner wounds, wounding relationships and wounding systems. The wounds long for witness. They want individuals, small groups, circles, that can listen to the anger, without needing to fix or fade it, silence or control it. If there are places to express and to receive our rage, then we don’t turn it on ourselves or each other. Only then does the wounding have a chance to be healed.

I remember once how we held space for rage in a North America Leadership Jam. One participant expressed his pain with extended screams. He was doubled over and needed to get his rage out. The shouts racked his body, over and over, and sounded so loud in our cozy meeting room. And while he was supported, as were the others in the space, no one moved to silence or stop him. We just kept breathing and bearing witness. The rage cracked him open, he released into his sorrow, and as a collective, we felt even more of the bigness of our love, compassion, care and forgiveness. The point is, the rage didn’t destroy the community. It added to it, because it was held with sacred listening and witnessing.

The key, for me, is raging without getting frozen there, or confusing it with the whole of the process. It is just a part, and it is essential. The listeners really need to remember this, and to take care of ourselves in the listening. I remember when I was in college, I would sometimes get annoyed when I would hear a friend complain about their struggle, because I would think that they have all the tools they need to solve it. And yet, that’s not what rage (or any of its derivatives like venting, complaining, expressing annoyance, etc.) needs. It just needs to be heard and witnessed. Only then can it get below the surface and into the depths of the pain.

Rage brings forward our animal bodies, and the fight instinct which relies upon binaries of either/or, ‘us’ vs. ‘them’. And, what if we could listen to it knowing it was temporary? Knowing it didn’t need to be ‘fixed’ or defended against, both of which block the expressions that want to come out and need someone to listen to them. What if the rage could be witnessed and given space? I think this would prevent it from sliding into verbal or physical attacks on others. Instead, we could get to the grief or loss underneath, and see the wound that wants to be seen.

I can’t even count the number of times this has happened in one-on-one and small group conflicts I have mediated. Once the people involved have had their anger heard, they start to un-freeze themselves and get unstuck from the moment they are in. They don’t need to be defensive about their reactions, because no one is saying they are wrong to feel. That allows them to come through their anger and resentment. With a bit of time, they start to un-freeze the other(s), too, and un-stick the story they have cemented in their heads. Soon enough, both parties begin to understand the tender wound that was triggered for each of them and what actually wants to be healed. Usually, these wounds are mirrors and echoes of each other. When they are seen and felt, transformation has an opportunity to unfold.

What would it look like to make space for this raging on a bigger scale — without the use of weapons and militaries, of course. It is too easy to slide from anger into attack, and I think that’s why it is so difficult. Part of what I see happening in Israel’s war on Gaza is similar to what I see happening with confederate white supremacists in the South or Hindu nationalists in India: rage around loss of control and power, and a deep river of fear, scarcity, greed, and vengefulness bolstering this rage. The pain is the loss, and the resulting fear, but because it is so immediately translated into an attack, with violent tools, the loss is entirely missed. Additionally, personal identities get conflated with state-sponsored or militia-sponsored actions. The identities themselves have become weaponized, so that any questioning of the violence feels like it is attacking someone’s being-ness as a human. The complexity of both/and, and the nuanced forms of human experience, have been suppressed in the kill-or-be-killed approach of the violence.

All of this is to say that it takes a lot of slowing down to be with rage, especially one that has expanded and caused even more suffering for others. And yet, I do trust that if it could be shared in a different container — without access to violent tools — that people have the capacity to get out of the panic zone of attack other, and get into the vulnerable stretch zone and the heart of the pain. In the process, they can restore their own full humanity and re-see that of others.

Grief. When we have space for the rage, and don’t freeze ourselves or each other in it, we can then flow into our grieving together — which is essential for softening the pathway for creativity and transformation.

I recently read Francis Weller’s book, The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief. In it, he talks about the five gates of grief: 1) grief for the loss of who and what we love (because everything we love, we will one day lose); 2) grief for that within us which has not received love; 3) grief for the suffering and sorrows of the world, for human and all Earth bodies; 4) grief for that which we expected and did not receive; and 5) ancestral grief that moves through generations.

What I really appreciated is that Weller is both demystifying grief and trying to democratize our roles in working with grief. He shares how simple it is to co-create spaces for grief and how easily we can expand access to it. In this way, grief can more readily move out of the shadows of shame and into the light of healing. This, to me, is so beautiful and so part of the medicine we need right now.

Emboldened by Weller’s words, and remembering moments we have practiced grief circles in Jams as well, I joined with people a few weeks ago to co-create a circle for grief, and one on online a few days ago as well. In both cases, the process was quite simple. It began with an invitation and, then with those who chose to come, we landed together in a quiet space near the water. Each of us had the opportunity to invite in any support we wanted from the Earth, from spirit, from ancestors, from the love around us, etc. Online, we began with a breath and body grounding, and invited everyone to call in any support they wanted. We also asked everyone to bring in earth elements — a candle to light a fire, a bowl of water, and an Earth object like a stone, leaf, etc., to connect with during our time online. The connection to Mother Earth in any grief work feels vital to me, because she is a great teacher on grief. She is constantly experiencing loss and death, as well as new beginnings and sustenance, and her wisdom can guide the healing with our own grief.

After grounding, we then had open space and time for people to share what they were grieving. In person, we built a cairn, in the Gaelic tradition, piling stones and shells and leaves, each as a symbol for the grief that was shared, spoken or unspoken. Online, we first held a check-in with small groups of three to share what was present and what our Earth objects meant to us. Then, we came back together and wrote on slips of paper what we were each grieving, using the prompts of, “I grieve…” “I mourn…” “I have lost…” “I am longing for…” There was soft music and an opportunity to slow down and tap in. We then offered space for people to vocalize what they were feeling and experiencing, and invited others to bear witness and to connect with a hand gesture on screen, if they too shared in this grief. Both online and in-person, we also sang together, to open our hearts and allow the channels of grief to flow more freely. We closed with a word/phrase check-in, and another deep breath to complete for now.The songs, the words, the Earth and simple ceremonial actions, all made space for tears to be shed, for each of us to be held and to know we were not alone.

Maybe grief is just a process of release on so many levels. The physical letting go with tears and sobs, the mental letting go of stories and future fantasies, the spiritual letting go of failures and disappointments... Doing that letting go in community, instead of trying to do it in isolation, is what makes the difference. “Your healing is my healing,” as someone once shared in another gathering on releasing childhood wounds. Could we grow more circles for grief in our communities and around the world? Imagine the healing that would abound.

Those of us working on environmental and climate change, social justice, peace, transformative change in any way, know the daily trauma of the bigness of the pain and smallness of each of us. So much suffering can take a major toll on the body, heart, mind and soul. Wellness and healing with this reality does not only mean resting and finding places to play, it also means finding places to express the rage and the grief, to not freeze ourselves or each other with it, and instead to be held gently and with tenderness.

My goal in this work is not to ‘end’ the sorrow, per se. I think it can be brought out, though, instead of eating us up from within. The weight can be placed down in a bigger context, there can be acceptance of it, and with that acceptance comes clarity. The sharing of grief gets me more in touch with my love, and then I can continue my journey of growing the world in and with love.

Love. On the other side of the rage and/or the grief is the love. Love for self, love for others, love for all of life. Our prayers, just like our pain, all point to love. Maybe when rage comes up in me, I could ask myself, “What do I love that is hurting right now?” Maybe when I see rage in others, I could remember that something is hurting, some love is misplaced or missing right now. And there is anger about it. And, underneath that rage is the loss and the grief.

With grief, I find it easier to see the love, and I can still ask the question and listen for the answers. The answers reveal the wounds. Those wounds don’t want to get stuck, they also want to be seen and heard, to return to the sacred flow of love. Making space for that witness and with-ness changes everything.

The times ahead are uncertain, and I know there will be more rage and more grief. I am entering the heart flow with it, and I invite you to join me there. We can pray and eat, too. No matter which way we go, we know all roads lead to love.

Please share in the comments your own experiences and feelings with Rage, Grieve, Love. I am listening.