There are people who grow older and become more rigid. And then there are people like Dick Van Dyke.
For a century now, he’s kept choosing lightness, humour, and optimism. One thing he has spoken about over the years is anger. Not to deny it. Not to pretend it doesn’t exist. But to recognise how much it takes from you when you carry it for too long.
That idea lands differently when you live with cerebral palsy. Anger isn’t always abstract. It's physical. It lives in the body. It never quite fades.
Then there's anger at having to explain yourself again. And again. And again.
Anger doesn’t start from nowhere and there are reasons someone has anger – anger is heavy.
It steals your joy. It resides in tight shoulders, shallow breath, in a clenched jaw. And when your body already works harder just to get through the day, that extra weight adds up. It drains energy.
Letting go of anger doesn’t mean letting injustice slide. It means deciding what deserves your strength.
Anger can be useful. It can sharpen your voice. It can push change forward. But it’s not a place to live. When it becomes permanent, it doesn’t protect – it harms.
What Dick Van Dyke seems to understand is that joy isn’t naïve. It’s deliberate, it's a choice. It’s choosing to stay open in a world that constantly asks people to harden themselves just to survive.
Joy doesn’t erase pain. It sits alongside it. There is power in saying: I’m angry – and I don’t want anger to own me.
Living with a disability like cerebral palsy demands resilience every day, often invisibly. Carrying bitterness on top of that isn’t strength. It’s extra work. As a child I struggled with anger because I wasn't seen or heard, with something I didn't know I was dealing with.
But maybe that’s the lesson – not that things are always fine. But that peace, where it is possible, is worth protecting.
