Resentment…Forgiveness
“Holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”
~Unknown
Resentment is a wall that is slowly built between one’s own self and the rest of the world one stone at a time over a period of weeks, months or years. Resentment is the process of where an individual feels that they have been unjustly mistreated and are holding onto that anger or hurt that they felt at that time. Resentment builds as the effect of repeated emotional injury accumulates over time as each stone in the wall is placed by a person who hurts us by creating feelings of being devalued or pushed aside. Resentments can build up against a single person or a group of people and the long lasting accumulative affect can lead a person to become emotionally shut off from the rest of the world, becoming angry and bitter at any slight perceived or real. Anger takes over for the person who has built up resentments and their life slowly spirals down into a hopeless pit of despair, anger, bitterness and sometimes, violence. No one wakes up and says to themselves, “Today I think I will develop resentment against my friends/family/coworkers and become hopelessly angry.” It just doesn’t happen that way. Disappointments (a very real part of life) and hurts (real or imagined) are all part of the path we walk each and every day and it is how we deal with these setbacks that determines our path forward.
Resentment is like low intensity warfare on your body, it makes you tense but in such small way at first you may not even know it. Clinching jaws, stiff necks, tight shoulder muscles? You might have resentments building up in your mental wellbeing and not even know it. Have a hard time of letting go of things that annoy you? Do you recall every little hurt you’ve ever felt with such fierce emotions that you feel like you are reliving all the emotional pain again? You probably have a wall of resentment right in front of you and can’t see it. In the immortal words of the singer Idina Menzel, you need to let it go. Let go of the anger. Let go of the hurt. Let go of the bitter feelings that creep up like poison ivy and choke out the happiness that is lingering inside. I’m not saying you can’t experience your feelings in the moment, but after the moment is over you need to dump those negative feelings, pour them out before they poison your soul.
One of the hardest things a person can do is to truly forgive someone for an emotional injury whether that person is yourself or someone else. But forgiveness is the best way forward towards removing resentments. Forgiving someone does not give that person a blank check to keep acting like an emotional marauding pirate to plunder your emotions at any given time but it does give the forgiver the ability to put the emotional hurt behind them and move on with life without bitterness. Resentments not only keep a person in an emotional prison but the physical effects on the body take a toll as well. There are several good article to read that go into greater detail about this state of emotional and physical siege and I encourage you to do a little extra reading on the topic. Our mental health and our physical health are intertwined for our overall personal wellbeing we must always be on guard to protect both.
As always, thanks for reading and I ask that you please pass this and my other articles on to your friends and family, you never know who you might touch and how it will impact them. As we all head into the Memorial Day weekend, I hope that you all are safe as you celebrate the memories of those who have gone before us…lift up those who need it by lending a helping hand or just a shoulder to lean on. Take care of yourself and each other, remember, we’re all in this together.
Wm Reid
Best Home Care Services
325 N Eastern Ave
Connersville, IN 47331
765-827-9833
wmreid@bhcshealth.com