What would it look like if we formed our activist communities around joy, not the suffering or the anger, as a basis for our change work?
– Lama Rod Owens, Buddhist minister, author, activist

Contributed by Binta Dixon, Editor-in-Chief of Exchange Press

My aunt Mary Lou Andrews was the matriarch of my father’s family. She was also a preschool and elementary school teacher for over 30 years. She held a group of about 50 cousins, uncles, aunts, and siblings together with tightly woven threads of love and support.

My aunt loved you by welcoming you into the truth of a situation and holding your hand while you wrestled with it. After she passed into the ancestral realm, I started to realize how much of her influence had been nurtured within me.

I have come to appreciate directness as a shade of kindness that is uncompromising in its values and rooted in fierce love. This is distinct from anger. My aunt rarely came to me or any of us young folks in anger. Instead, it was a healthy fire, burning away excuses and lighting the way forward.

There is a way that well-seasoned emotions can feel intense when our palettes are not accustomed to rich flavors. Compassion, to some, can feel harsh or even mean.

When working with children and adults, it is important to meet them where they are in their understanding of the wide range of emotions we experience as humans.

Lama Rod Owens says in his book Love and Rage: The Path of Liberation through Anger, “I have had to learn to invite my broken heart to dine with me at the table. It is meaningless to run now. My broken heart is not a judgment or a crime. It is a detailed record of how I have tried to meet the violence of the world with as much openness as possible.”

Many of us have broken hearts that show up as anger, and this is a beautiful first step. When we are ready, hand in hand with others in our community, we can walk through anger and into fierce love for ourselves, our children, and the world. This is the way my aunt lived, and it is a legacy I intend to carry forward.