A Raging Grief

The action of non-action

“I just realized something. You want people to know that it’s all going to work out. I want them to stay mad and make that happen.”

This is paraphrased from a conversation I was having with a friend who has labored mightily, and publicly, against the horrific suppression of the data, and the conclusions we can draw from them, about the dangers of the childhood vaccination program.

His grief over what has been done rages. He weeps and rants when sharing his research in private settings, perhaps more so because he must contain that emotion in the public forum.

This essay isn’t about that topic, but it IS about that feeling.

We all know that feeling. Anger is the emotion that drives change, while grief is the emotion that signals acceptance. If we embrace grief, do we abandon the belief that things can change?

No. What we abandon is the belief that we control the change. What we accept is the truth that we are not in control, and can only take the next right step with as much clarity as we have been granted.

But sometimes knowing it’s all going to work out involves being angry.

Pretending not to be is a lie. And it doesn’t work out as long as we’re lying.

I recognize that I have addictions. I have behaviors that I connect to positive feelings, and then I make the positive feelings dependent on the behaviors. I will say, I cannot quit coffee because my coffee ritual is the bridge between my sleep and my day. I cannot quit coffee because I associate coffee with contentment, but then contentment becomes contingent on coffee and I spend the entire morning choosing discontentment until I drink coffee.

I will make endless excuses for why this is okay, but those excuses, too, are addiction, because if this weren’t addiction, I would not need excuses.

Knowing this, then, I must change it, and, in changing it, grieve.

And rage.

Because it is not fair that something I enjoy is not good for me. It is not fair that, knowing I am dependent, I must assert my will and correct that dependence. It is not fair that it is not fair.

And yet, it is so. Therefore, like so much that is not fair, I must accept it, must grieve it, and must acknowledge that I am uncomfortable, that I am experiencing loss, that I am forced to contend with the nature of my dependence on outsourcing my contentment.

You may be asking yourself how we got to coffee from raging grief at the mutilating and murdering of children.

Because I’ve recognized another addiction in myself. I’m addicted to information. I’m convinced that I need to know as much as possible of what is happening, so that I can be right, convinced that I need to track the vicissitudes of this world so I can be successful.

It’s robbing me of wisdom.

I saw a man murdered on live video, and I saw people celebrate that murder. I saw a young girl stabbed to death, and I saw organizations and individuals justify the act. I saw children blown apart and I saw politicians and pundits wave it away. I saw a five year old girl,

I can’t.

I’ve seen enough. We are not made to see all this. We are not made to crack under the grief of suffering and horror. And so it becomes performative, or paltry.

It was once said to me, you can’t be sad enough. You will destroy yourself and never empty the tides with a teaspoon.

What does it mean to let this go, to take what action is mine to take and know that I must accept what is past, and what is beyond my control, lest my every action be dictated by efforts to change that which cannot be altered?

It means that I will be wrong, that there will be successes that are not mine.

Maybe you are reading this and thinking, “your friend is right; you must stay mad to make it change.” To that I would say, I cannot be angry enough. Who am I in raging anger at what has been? I am a person who is not here, now, taking action in the sphere of my influence. I am the person whose own children’s joy is overshadowed by the keening grief of a mother I do not know. I am the person whose own beautiful life becomes a war zone of the mind.

So I can feel anger, and I can name it. But then I can grieve, I can accept, and I can find contentment where contentment finds me.

And so, paradoxically, by chasing less, I can act, and by knowing less, be wiser.