Resistance & Rage: Why Acceptance Isn’t Always the First Step

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THE SHIFT

Resistance & Rage: Why Acceptance Isn’t Always the First Step

There are situations we get thrown into where we’re scraping and clinging, resisting the inevitable. We can see the threshold in front of us—the place we’ll have to cross, whether we want to or not—and still we dig in our heels. It’s like trying to fight a river with our bare hands.

You may know this space.

If you’ve ever sat in a hospital and watched someone slip away from this life, if you’ve ever counted the days before your partner leaves for deployment, if you’ve ever waited in terror, knowing at the end of nine months, that baby is coming out one way or another, if you’ve heard the click of the door after someone says, I can’t do this anymore, if you’ve stood in the wreckage after a storm and known that no amount of wishing will rebuild your home — then you are familar with this experience.

I’m in one of those spaces right now. Between what I wanted and what is actually happening. Between what I expected, dreamed up, and believed would unfold—and the stark, suffocating reality that is.

This space is pain.

When I searched the literature on this experience, everything talked about letting the situation deepen your capacity, expand your wisdom, help you grow. They said “use resistance as a teacher”, allow it to let you be more present. 

And honestly, I’ve written those same things in this newsletter. 

But this week, when I read them again, all I felt was disgust and rage. I don’t want to be deep or wise. I don’t want to “transform resentment into clarity.” I don’t want to take it as a “lesson” to develop. I know I’m “strong and can get through it,” but frankly, I don’t want to be this strong, and I don’t want to have to move through it.

I found myself screaming internally: Stop asking me to cooperate with what’s hurting me.

What we don’t talk about much is that before acceptance comes, a kind of tantrum—a full-body, screaming, crying, tossing-yourself-on-the-floor kind of protest, might need to happen.

There’s a misconception, in stoic and spiritual teachings, that you’re not supposed to feel rage or despair—that wisdom means being calm through everything. But the more I study, the more I realize that’s not what these wise people meant.

They didn’t say, don’t feel. They said, don’t get stuck there. There’s a difference. When you resist anger, you double your suffering; when you indulge it, you harm yourself.

But it does take time to metabolize what you hate. You have to let it exist in you long enough to know what it is. To negotiate with it.

If you’re in this space right now too, do not make “acceptance” another burden to carry. Stop trying to digest something that’s still burning. Right now, let yourself not accept. Let the tears, the fury, the exhaustion be. Slow everything down. You don’t have to take in anyone’s “lesson” right now.

Give yourself space to answer: What feels most unbearable right now?

Maybe it’s the loneliness. Maybe it’s the unfair nature, the injustice of living in an indifferent world. Perhaps it’s the loss of the life you imagined or the feeling powerless in the face of what is happening. 

Name the unbearable crushing nature of the experience. Let the rage and despair breathe. 

There are certainly steps that can be taken later to transform something painful into something… I don’t know, less painful? But if you’re not there yet—that’s okay. Just let it suck.

And tell someone how much it sucks. And let them be in it with you.

I realize that’s not the most hopeful message. There’s no “5 Steps to Release Resistance” here. But that’s kind of the point. Maybe real acceptance is simply admitting that this, too, has a place.

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A NOTE

Just a heads-up: things will be changing around here—including the title of this newsletter. After a year of doing this work, I have a clearer sense of the direction I want to go and what I want to focus on. To reflect that, I’ll be making a few shifts.

If you ever read something here that really hits home, I hope you’ll share it with someone. While I’d love for this newsletter to be passed along, what matters most to me is that it sparks real conversations—between you and a friend, a partner, a family member. My hope is that these pieces become catalysts for reflection, for wrestling (or maybe dancing) with your own demons, and for finding connection with others who’ve stood in similar spaces.