Rage

After a week of voicing my community’s pain to other people- my pastors, my small group, helping my team of asian-american women process their pain… this morning the weight of the pain collapsed on me, as I finally had a chance to voice to MYSELF the pain I feel.

I go to an outdoor spin class (distanced, all with headphones on)… and found myself yelling out loud, and thankfully everyone had headphones on so they couldn’t hear that the yelling was f-bomb after f-bomb. I think the spin instructor thought I was just really feeling it in the hamstrings (…well I was) but really I just felt like the pent up rage was needing to escape somewhere. I left the class and yelled in my car for a few minutes…

I am so tired…
…of being a perpetual foreigner
…of being “the accessible asian friend” model minority
…of being scared that in trying to lovingly explain my community’s pain that I’ll get the “But your people are so educated and wealthy”
…of trying to sound not too angry to white folks
…of trying to sound angry enough so other minorities trust me
…of saying very loudly “ugh. ALLERGIES” every time I sneeze in public
…of imagining if one of those women were my wife, my sister, my mom, my aunts, my teammates, my…
…of the entanglement of racism and sexism on blatant display, and everyone trying to make a decision on which one it is on social media (IT’S BOTH EVERYONE)
…of Christian men trying to solve their temptation by projecting their shame and self-hatred on women, and NOT OWNING OUR OWN SIN.
…of having to explain all of this.

So if I’m a little out of it this weekend, that’s why. I will get back to loving others soon, to having patience, to taking initiative to have hard conversations, to ending the cycle of hatred and shame with grace, to building bridges… this for me is no obligation, but a sober loving choice I have made in how I live my life. But just for a moment, I think I need to just stop, and be angry. be sad. be frustrated. be tired…. so maybe I can rest, have patience, grieve well, speak up and press in again.