Let the Fire Speak

Sometimes, when people start practicing Zen, they expect calm.

They want quiet.

Peace. Stillness. A little relief from the chaos.

But instead, what comes up is rage.

Not always loud rage, sometimes it simmers. Sometimes it shakes. Sometimes it hides under a smile or shows up as a sudden urge to scream in traffic or throw your phone across the room. Sometimes it’s older than you know. Generational. Cellular. Holy.

This is where most people panic. They think: I must be doing it wrong. I’m supposed to be peaceful, why am I shaking?

But here’s what I’ve learned, both on the cushion and off:

The fire isn’t a failure. It’s the practice.

Zen doesn’t ask you to be polite. It doesn’t care if you’re calm. It doesn’t want you to bypass your pain in the name of serenity. It wants you to feel it. All of it. Even the parts you’ve buried. Especially those.

When I first sat with my rage, I expected it to eat me alive. I thought it would burn down everything I’d built. But it didn’t. It burned through the numbness. Through the denial. Through the polite little versions of myself I’d built to survive.

And then it spoke.

Not in words, exactly. But in knowing.

In truth.

In clarity.

In boundaries that had waited years to rise.

That’s what happens when you let the fire speak.

You find out what you really believe.

You remember who you were before you started shrinking.

Applied Zen doesn’t suppress the fire. It sits with it.

Not to tame it. Not to fix it. To witness it, fully, with breath, with love, with the kind of sacred presence that says: I can handle you. I’m not leaving.

This is what trauma survivors need. This is what queer and neurodivergent folks need. This is what anyone who has ever had to swallow their truth to survive needs: a practice that makes room for heat.

Not just quiet. Not just peace.

Honest fire.

So if you sit and tremble, good.

If you cry and can’t name why, good.

If you rage and it scares you, good.

That’s the sound of your real voice returning.

Let it speak.