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Practice: Contemplating Anger So many works of social justice have been undone by people who do all the fighting from their angry selves. Today’s practice invites us to deal with our anger contemplatively, not just for ourselves but for those we seek to help and even those with whom we are in conflict. Teacher Dan Edwards writes: The gift that contemplative practice brings to our emotions is awareness, the mental space to confront our emotional state in a safe way. . . . Ange...r is the dominant emotion for many activists. . . . Anger is not a bad or negative thing; it is actually the fuel that feeds our quest for justice. It is when we let anger lead to hateful actions that we lose its beneficial potential. . . . It is imperative that we realize that often the injustice or wrongdoing isn’t personal but rather a societal ill and will always coexist with the peaceful lives we work hard to live. Practice: Stop, Breathe, Reflect and Respond. Once I am aware that anger is arising, I stop. I breathe in and out, and I pay attention to my breath, so that I can come back into my body and ground myself. I breathe until the dominate [sic] voices of anger dissipate and my focus rests comfortably on my breath and the current moment. I can now begin to reflect on the situation from a grounded place. I then reflect on my personal ties to this wrongdoing and examine the reasons why it is affecting me so. . . . Most of the real work is done here, and this is where contemplative practice will become an invaluable tool. It is your contemplative mind that puts up signs like highway markers that point right back to you and encourage you to heal yourself from anger before healing others. Take as much time as you need to reflect. In the end, I respond after I have reflected for some time on the act or situation. If the situation requires an immediate response, I may not respond at allnot because I am being passive or ignorant but because I am aware of how connected I am to the situation and how deeply personal my response may be. If I feel that I am not able to react from a grounded place, then I won’t. This method has helped keep me out of heated debates and actions that I would later feel the need to apologize for. So if your reactions are heated, give this method a shot. It may work for you. Dan Edwards, Dealing with Anger, The Activist’s Ally: Contemplative Tools for Social Change (The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society: 2007, 2017), 46, 47. http://www.contemplativemind.org/

May your hands be an extension of your heart and may you do the work of love with them. - Aja MonetMay your hands be an extension of your heart and may you do the work of love with them. - Aja Monet

Going high doesn’t mean putting on a smile and saying nice things when confronted by viciousness and cruelty. Going high means taking the harder path. It means scraping and clawing our way to that mountain top. - Michelle ObamaGoing high doesn’t mean putting on a smile and saying nice things when confronted by viciousness and cruelty. Going high means taking the harder path. It means scraping and clawing our way to that mountain top. - Michelle Obama