Anger, Allyship and Necessary Endings

Hope Infusion Newsletter • March Edition

March is said to come in like a lion and go out like a lamb. It rolls in clinging to the vestiges of Winter, and rolls out having transitioned to the onset of Spring. I find the lion analogy resonant this month because I channeled my inner lioness when I wrote the featured essay during a memoir workshop exploration of Anger.

Anger is often considered a negative emotion, but not all anger is bad. Sometimes anger shows up as a supportive ally, a bright beacon illuminating the path to something new. This month’s story is about one of those times.

Welcome to Hope Infusion Newsletter’s March Edition. I’m glad you’re here!

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When Anger Is An Ally

My iPhone dinged alerting me to an incoming text message. As I scanned the details, my eyes widened, my pulse raced, and my body temperature ticked up several degrees— it was from the CEO of the small company with whom I’d been employed for 9 years.

June 1, 2020. A week after the murder of George Floyd. A month after the murder of Brianna Taylor. A month after videos of the vigilante killing of Ahmaud Arbury in my home state of Georgia were released to the public. 

Covid shutdowns were in effect. Political tensions were high. The pandemic was raging, and after reading that text message, so was I.

I’m not a crier.

My children, if asked, would confirm that their tender hearted father cries FAR more than I. But as Murderous May 2020 drew to a close with the crushing of George Floyd’s, windpipe under the weight of a policeman’s knee—something in me broke. 

I was diligent to avoid watching footage of the murder. But I encountered a clip by accident when I walked into my family room as it was shown on live TV, and was unable to locate the remote in time to change the channel.

Once seen, I could not unsee the heart-rending images of a fellow human’s life force mercilessly extinguished, as he lay on the ground, subdued by force, crying out for his deceased mother with his dying breath. 

My maternal heart shattered — a ruptured dam no longer able to restrain the force of raging flood waters. My eyes poured forth a deluge of tears, as I wept uncontrollably for 10 days straight.

Four hundred years of the collective trauma of my ancestors,  present in my body, alive in my DNA, staged a hostile takeover of my emotional faculties, defiantly refusing to be silenced.

At the end of Memorial Day week I sent notice to my employer that I was taking the following week off.  I could not present myself professionally in scheduled meetings if I could not control an UN-controllable torrent of tears. 

The incoming text that transported me from grief to rage was a request from our CEO that arrived during the time I took off to mourn. It asked me to craft the equivalent of an All Lives Matter statement on behalf of the company.

I had a visceral reaction to the brazenness of this ask. My inner lioness broke from her cage as a tide swell of anger coursed through my frame. 

I was an F5 tornado. A category 5 hurricane. An erupting volcano. The temerity of THAT company requesting that I perform THAT task was flagrant in its shamelessness.

That company... 

The one that tasked me with servicing clients who openly used bigoted language and made discriminatory requests.

The one whose leadership proudly touted being a “Christian company”, regularly soliciting prayer from staff for God’s favor …even as they embraced clients who were unapologetic about racial and religious bias.

The one that cheered my praises as a model employee and “acceptable negro” until the final 2 of 9 years when I began to push back on some of the displays of bigotry, and to question internal practices of blatant dishonesty.

I felt like a disoriented post surgical patient, recovering from the effects of anesthesia, as I slowly awakened to the reality, that I had been deemed “acceptable” only as long as I operated in silent conformity.

My Black presence was welcomed for the perception it created about the embrace of diversity. But looking Black, for the sake of appearances, is far different from actually BEING Black, ACTING Black, or giving voice to anything perceived as “Black concerns”—which was not welcomed.

And yet…..

She boldly asked the only Black employee in the company, to craft a disingenuous statement, about the company’s support for “all lives” and God's love for “all people.” A statement wholly incongruent with my experience of 9 years, and disconnected from the reality of the workplace culture and how it functioned.

The indignation that overtook me as I read the text, released me from the grip of grief, as an avalanche of anger moved in to fill the void.

I’m aware that time and emotion can distort one’s memory of emotionally volatile events. But because this request was made via text, and followed up with email, I need not rely on memory to recall what transpired. I retain a written record of exactly what was asked.

I gave myself four days to gather my thoughts, before responding. And when I did, it was with a long over due resignation letter. 

Disconcerting as this all was, in hindsight, I see a through line of destiny that undergirded all that transpired.

Though offended by the words and deeds of my former employer, I do not absolve myself of responsibility for some of what went awry. It’s human nature to choose a familiar discomfort over an unfamiliar change. I was guilty of that.

My experience with that organization, was NOT all negative. The job offered a flexibility of schedule that served me well during my latter child rearing years. And though I loved neither the ethics nor some of the business practices of the leader, there were team members with whom I worked well and with whom I developed genuinely congenial relationships.

The inconvenient truth about the issues that led to my departure, is that they had LONG been evident. They were the “familiar discomfort” I trained myself to compartmentalize and look past.

Anger arrived on the scene to stage an intervention and offer a way out. It was a supportive ally that facilitated my exit, by empowering me to initiate a “necessary ending.”

Getting to the next level of personal development sometimes requires ending a toxic relationship and moving on. Endings sometimes require killing off things in which we were vested, uprooting what we once nurtured, and tearing down things we previously built.

Sometimes anger and endings are twin blessings in disguise — two missing links in the chain of forward progress.

Sometimes…you have to let go of the past and just be done. Not mad. Not upset. Just done!

Anger was the bridge over troubled waters that guided me from a distress filled yesterday to a purpose driven today. And upon arrival, I found deferred dreams, forgotten hope, and postponed passion waiting to embrace me.

They welcomed me with open arms, joyful at my return to my truest self: “Welcome Home Love!”, they said. “We’re glad you’re back. What took you so long?”

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Signs & Synchronicities

One of the most profound synchronicities regarding my departure from my former place of employment was the date on which it fell. I gave two weeks notice on June 5, hence my last day fell on June 19.

June 19th is Juneteenth, the day in 1865 when slaves in Texas learned that the Emancipation Proclamation had ended slavery two years prior. They’d been free for two years and didn’t know it.

Interestingly, when I approached my husband about leaving, his response was: “You finally see what I’ve been seeing. You should’ve been gone two years ago! Say your peace and leave.”

I was not enslaved, but had similarly labored in a hostile environment two years longer than necessary.

I posed for these pictures that final day to accompany an essay I’d written about the Juneteenth. The story behind the pictures is a reminder that a life changing level of freedom often awaits, just on the other side of a hard decision.

Two years later, I’ve experienced a grand total of ZERO days of regret!

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What I’ve Read and How It Helped Me

There are two books that were instrumental in me learning the lessons Life wanted to teach me from this experience. The first is Necessary Endings by Dr. Henry Cloud. I read it two years before these events occurred, and it laid a foundation for the necessary ending I needed to initiate.

DESCRIPTION: Endings are not a tragedy to be first feared and later regretted, but a necessary stage on the way to growth. Endings are a crucial way to get what we desire by shedding those things whose time has passed. The author addresses benefits of concluding unsatisfying work or personal relationships, and advises readers on diagnosing when the situation can be resuscitated or must be shut down

The second book is My Grandmother’s Hands—Racialized Trauma and The Pathway To Healing Our Hearts And Bodies, by Resmaa Menakem. I first read it a few months after my departure, and then revisited it in 2021. I spent the first six months of last year immersed in a weekly chapter by chapter study of this work in community with one of my book groups.

My Grandmother’s Hands is the singularly most impactful book I read last year, and one to which I return often as a reference tool. I don’t know that I will ever be permanently finished with this insightful resource.

My husband and I both participated in the community that read this book together. Our understanding of how we have internalized the trauma of navigating life in America with bodies sheathed in dark skin, is forever changed from that invaluable time of study.

But the blessing, is that it helped us work through repressed trauma, that is now forever healed! We weren’t just helped as Black individuals. We were helped as a Black couple.

Description: Therapist Resmaa Menakem examines the damage caused by racism in America from the perspective of trauma and body-centered psychology. The body is where our instincts reside and where we fight, flee, or freeze. It endures the trauma inflicted by the ills that plague society.

My Grandmother's Hands is a call to action for all of us to recognize that racism is not only about the head but also about the body. It introduces an alternative view of what we can do to grow beyond our entrenched racialized divide.