Fwd: A Letter to My Unbothered Friend, From Your Angry Friend
Janet O'Connell
Begin forwarded message:
From: Patricia Dahlman <patda...@comcast.net>
Date: November 14, 2025 at 5:05:29 PM CST
Subject: Fwd: A Letter to My Unbothered Friend, From Your Angry Friend
Very good!Choosing some folks who MIGHT be able to use this!!!
Sent from my iPhone,Pat
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: The Beautiful Mess by John Pavlovitz <johnpa...@substack.com>
Date: Fri, Nov 14, 2025 at 8:06 AM
Subject: A Letter to My Unbothered Friend, From Your angry friend
Of course, this isn’t meant for you as you are NOT my unbothered friends.
Dear Friend,
Thank you for your note letting me know that you’re worried about me, that you’re concerned about my health, and that you’re not sure that I realize I’m coming across as really angry lately.
I do realize it, and yes, your assessment is correct.
I am angry.I can imagine I’m not all that fun to be around right now, and that from time to time my words can be received as combative or abrasive. I’m probably more than a bit of a downer lately, and I apologize.
You’re going to have to bear with me, as I haven’t been sleeping well for a decade or so. Admittedly, I’m not at my best these days. I’m chronically overtired. I’m physically and emotionally exhausted from having to give all the sh*ts about people that you’re supposed to be giving, along with my own.
I’m worn out from keeping up on legislation and watching hearings and staying on top of details and remembering deadlines and imploring action, while you go about your day as if such things are an annoyance, as if they are a disruption of your plan, as if the expiration date for my outrage should have long come and gone.
I am absolutely burnt out from trying to make my voice loud enough to counteract not only the bad people’s incredible volume but also so many good people’s deafening silence. Both of these things are doing similar damage here right now, sadly.
Believe me, I understand that my activism is a problem for you. Please know that your inactivism is similarly problematic for me, and part of the reason I am as angry as I am. I’m not only having to fight against those who seem furiously bent on hurting people, but also having to try and rouse those who don’t seem bothered by the fact that they are doing so to say anything.
Look, I get it, I really do. It’s difficult to see so much sorrow, to absorb so much bad news, to fully face the relentless flood of terrible, to try and wrap your brain around seemingly boundless cruelty around you. It’s tiresome to spend so much time with a closed fist. I know it’s even a pain in the rear end to endure the continual rantings of people like me on your news feed and in your timeline and across the dinner table and in the break room. Honestly, if I weren’t me, I’d probably mute my social media profile to avoid seeing me.
I’m tired of angry me, too.
I’m sick of this elevated emotional state.
I’d rather not be doing this, either.
I’d much prefer to just enjoy life, to forget about it all, to only post pictures of puppies and my kids, and to simply ignore all that “political garbage” out there.
But that is what privilege looks like: to even believe I have such an option, to have the great luxury of living without urgency because I can seemingly shield myself from it all.
That is what the bad people are counting on. They’re counting on good people being too tired, too apathetic, too selfish, or too oblivious to sustain their outrage. I am not going to give that gift to them.
As long as they’re fully invested in putting people through hell, I’m going to be as invested in pushing back against it.
I think the people I love are worth it.
I think you and the people you love are worth it.
I think people I’ll never meet are worth it.And that’s the rub here: love will often look a lot like rage, as it fiercely fights on behalf of those who are being brutalized.
So yes, angry is not all that I am, but I am rightly angry.
And it would be really helpful if we could carry the massive load of these outrageous days together.
If you could be a bit less unbothered right now, you and I could partner in being a source of rest and hope and peace for people deprived of these things.
That would actually give me great joy.
So yes, I am angry, friend.
I wish you were angry too.
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