01/22/2026
WISDOM DROP - Anger as Medicine
Let’s talk about anger - and the ways we’ve been taught to fear it, suppress it, or wield it as the only acceptable emotion depending on our gender.
For women and femmes, anger has been stolen. We’ve been conditioned to believe that “nice girls don’t get angry.” That rage makes us difficult, unstable, too much. We’ve learned to swallow it, smile through it, redirect it inward where it becomes depression, anxiety, chronic pain in our bodies.
But anger isn’t a flaw. It’s information. It’s boundary energy. It tells us what needs protecting, what’s been violated, what we’re no longer willing to tolerate.
When women reclaim their anger - their roar, their NO - they reclaim their power. The rage that’s been suppressed doesn’t disappear when we ignore it. It lives in our bodies, creating havoc in our nervous systems, our relationships, our sense of self.
For men and masculine-identifying folks, the teaching has been different but equally limiting. Anger has been the only socially acceptable emotion. Sadness becomes anger. Fear becomes anger. Grief, vulnerability, tenderness - all of it gets converted into rage because that’s what’s permitted.
This cultural permission to express anger as the default emotion creates its own violence - internal and external. When anger becomes the mask for every other feeling, there’s no room for the full range of what it means to be human.
Here’s what I know from working somatically with emotion: anger is medicine for all of us when we know how to work with it consciously.
It’s not about suppressing it or exploding with it. It’s about learning to feel it in your body, to understand what it’s protecting, to move the energy without causing harm to yourself or others.
Anger tells the truth. It says “this is not okay” when something violates your boundaries, your values, your sense of safety. When we deny ourselves access to that information - or when it’s the only information we can access - we lose connection to our wholeness.
What if we could reclaim anger as the powerful, clarifying force it actually is? What if women could rage without apology? What if men could cry without converting it to fury? What if we all had permission to feel the full spectrum of what moves through us?
The work is learning to be with anger somatically - to let it move, to listen to what it’s saying, to honor the energy without letting it control us. To understand that suppressed anger and explosive anger are both responses to the same cultural wound: the belief that our full emotional experience isn’t acceptable.
Your anger is allowed. Your boundaries are allowed. Your voice is allowed.
I’m a Professional Holistic Counselor, Life Coach and Somatic Educator on Vancouver Island. I work collaboratively with those who wish to experience expressive therapies and nature-based healing. If you’re looking for support that unearths your body’s wisdom and helps you reclaim the full range of your emotional experience, DM me or find me at www.wildhumanwellness.ca
Until next time, may you walk wild and free.
