We Weren't Meant to Live Like This

Outrage everywhere, all at once

There’s a lot of outrage in the world right now. So much so, that it’s become the norm to scream into the digital void, for anyone, and everyone who will listen. Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and much to my dismay even LinkedIn, have all become dumping grounds for the collective nervous system overload affecting us.

Each time there’s an incident we can’t “unsee,” hundreds of people take to their devices to share their overwhelm. But what if we didn’t offload our trauma onto the masses? What if we could sit with these big feelings without the need for mass validation? What if instead of allowing anger to consume us, we could sit with the sadness, grief, and feelings of helplessness peeking out from the messy edges of the rage?

And I know what you’re thinking. But anger can be good. We need anger. And yes, absolutely. But I want to challenge all of us to feel the anger and then dig a little deeper. While anger can start a revolution, it can also strip us of the empathy we need to stay connected.

So how do we do this? And how do we teach our kids to tend to their inner world without offloading their big feelings into the digital void?

Not everything needs an audience

It starts with slowing down. With creating space between the feeling and the reaction. Not everything needs to be witnessed by the internet in order to be real or valid. Some emotions need quiet. Some need containment. Some need to be felt privately before they are shared publicly, if they are shared at all.

For adults, this might look like pausing before posting. Asking ourselves: Am I sharing to connect, or am I sharing to discharge? Am I seeking understanding, or am I unconsciously asking strangers to hold something I haven’t yet held myself? There’s no shame in overwhelm, but there is responsibility in how we process it.

For kids, the lesson is even more critical. They're watching us and learning how to handle big feelings by observing how we handle ours. When they see adults immediately externalize anger, outrage, or fear, they learn that discomfort must be expelled fast and preferably with an audience. What they don’t learn is how to stay with an emotion long enough to understand it.

When anger becomes our only language

Teaching children to tend to their inner world means giving them language beyond “mad” or “fine.” It means helping them notice what lives underneath the anger: sadness, fear, embarrassment, grief. It also means reminding them that none of these feelings are dangerous. It means modeling that emotions don’t need to be performed to be processed.

Anger has its place. It can illuminate injustice. It can catalyze change. But when anger becomes our only fluent emotional language, we lose access to nuance, compassion, and connection. And when we bypass grief or fear in favor of rage, we risk hardening in ways that make it harder to stay human with one another.

The work is quiet, unglamorous, and deeply necessary. It’s learning how to feel without immediately broadcasting. To sit with discomfort without demanding resolution or validation. To teach the next generation that emotions are not problems to be solved, but signals to be understood.

And maybe this is where the conversation really begins. Because if we’re honest, what we’re witnessing online isn’t just outrage. It’s loneliness. It’s a longing to be seen, heard, and understood in a world that increasingly rewards speed over depth and reaction over reflection. We’re turning to platforms and algorithms to do work that can only be done by other humans.

We can’t outsource our humanity

I wrote once that robots don’t love you. And they still don’t. They can’t sit with your grief. They can’t hold complexity. They can’t meet you in the quiet space where empathy lives. Yet more and more, we’re outsourcing our emotional lives to systems designed to amplify, not attune.

This is why an empathy movement isn’t a nice to have. It’s vital.

Empathy is what allows us to stay curious instead of certain. To listen instead of react. To recognize that beneath someone else’s anger is often a story we don’t yet understand. It’s what keeps us human in an increasingly automated, optimized, outrage-driven world.

So I’m curious. What would change if we treated empathy as a practice, not a personality trait? If we taught it as intentionally as we teach literacy or math? If we modeled it for our kids not just in moments of calm, but in moments of conflict?

What if the quiet work of tending to our inner world became a radical act? What if choosing to pause, to feel, to listen before we post or react became part of a larger cultural shift?

I don’t have all the answers. But I do believe this. If we want a more connected world, we have to practice connection where it’s hardest. Inside ourselves first, and then with one another.

And maybe that’s where an empathy movement begins. Not with louder voices, but with deeper listening. Sending love!

💛 Jenna