The Jewish month for anger

Embracing the value of an uncomfortable feeling

I didn’t want 2023 to end without checking in one last time. This substack began as a New Year’s resolution so it feels important to write one more time before 2024.

Lately I’ve been thinking about anger. A friend from Jews for Racial and Economic Justice shared with me that the Hebrew month of Tevet which began on Wednesday the 13th, is associated with the chush or sense of anger. I was grateful to learn this as someone who can often unintentionally distance myself from my emotions, and particularly struggles with anger.

Anger generally gets a bad rap, and for some valid reasons. Particularly in the hands of the powerful, unrestrained anger often translates into violence. My sister, a licensed therapist once taught me that “anger is fear’s bodyguard.” I have valued this teaching a lot. This month however, I’m also thinking about the value of anger for anger’s sake. Anger, like all our emotions, has an important role to play in our inner and interpersonal lives.

Audre Lorde said the following about anger:

My response to racism is anger. I have lived with that anger, ignoring it, feeding upon it, learning to use it before it laid my visions to waste, for most of my life. Once I did it in silence, afraid of the weight. My fear of anger taught me nothing. Your fear of that anger will teach you nothing, also.

I’ve been thinking about listening to anger as a sort of alarm bell. It tells us that a moral line has been crossed. The question I have is what to do with that signal?

Last week I was volunteering as an escort at Planned Parenthood. There was a group of evangelical protestors who came to harass the women seeking care there. At one point, one of the men in the group stepped out into the street to face the building. He gave a speech shouting at the top of his lungs. I hoped that Planned Parenthood had invested in soundproof windows, because it made me sick to think about patients inside having to listen to his vitriol.

As I stood on the corner, keeping an eye out for arriving patients, I was forced to listen to the man’s words. I could feel the anger creeping up in my body. My muscles and chest felt tight. My stomach ached slightly. I — a person who hasn’t gotten in a single bona fide fistfight in my whole life — started imagining myself going up to the man and knocking his bible to the ground and punching him in the face.

This would have served no purpose. I doubt I would have felt better myself.

So then what? I think the predominant message in these cases is to practice deep breathing and mindfulness and to let it go. In honor of the month of Tevet, I’m wondering what other options we can choose from?

It seems to make sense to begin by asking myself why I felt so angry. I was angry because of the man’s entitled behavior. I was angry about his worldview which prioritizes a cluster of cells over a person’s bodily autonomy or the millions of children who are alive and in need of greater care. I was angry at the way he was pushing his worldview on others, including women who may already be emotionally distraught. I was angry at a legal system that allows that harassment.

While acting on my rage toward this individual man would have been counterproductive, the rage itself served a clarifying purpose. Reflecting on these various sources of my anger, I see a lot of places where I can direct that anger productively. I can work alongside others to make sure abortion is legal, accessible and well-resourced.

As 2023 draws to a close, I am also feeling a deep well of anger over Israel’s war on Gaza. In honor of Tevet, I will allow myself to feel that anger. I will use it to seek clarity and find a path to action. I know I will direct much of my anger at U.S. elected officials who refuse to work to end the violence and continue to supply money and weapons for Israel’s genocide. But I imagine there are other uses for my anger that I will find by connecting to others who are also outraged.

Anger’s value is by serving as a reminder of our humanity. We can only feel outrage if we care and if we believe that a better world is possible. I’m hoping in 2024 we can channel our anger amidst our other feelings to try to build that world.

NOTE: I plan to leave Substack in 2024 because they seem cool with making money off Nazis. Stay tuned.

2023 Superlatives

Favorite Book: I love short stories and Lot by Bryan Washington was a great collection of stories centering a queer Afrolatino man in Houston.

Favorite Movie: Lots to choose from but I thought Dream Scenario was delightfully weird in all its Nicholas Cage glory.

Favorite Song: You can’t beat this chorus:

“I ain't got no boy, but I got my tall boy
I don't need no small man when I got my tall can
You may think I'm living a low life with my High Life
But I tell you boy, I'm doin' alright”

Favorite App: AnyList I love this app because you can import recipes from practically any site! I use it for stockpiling recipes, meal planning, and grocery shopping.)

Favorite article I wrote: Current Affairs, "The ‘Uber-ification’ of Teaching Will Destroy Public Education"

Honorable Mention: eJewishPhilanthropy, "A Jewish nonprofit is changing the way a Florida city responds to 911 calls"

Favorite podcast episode I wrote: