Dealing with resentment

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Working with resentment — techniques and procedures that remove resentment (sense of resentment) or translate its manifestations into a civilized channel.

It is important to keep in mind that not all resentment needs to be removed: if a feeling of resentment tells you that in front of you is a boor who does not respect you, then perhaps you should not remove the offense, but stop dealing with such a person and start making other promising contacts.

Resentment often takes the form of pent-up anger, so dealing with resentment is a lot like working with anger and intersects with it.

In dealing with resentment, it can be important to understand the causes of resentment. As a rule, here in the first place is internal benefit, in the second place is stereotyped thinking and narrow-mindedness, in the third place are negative anchors and, as a result, involuntary emotional response.

Internal gain is one of the most common reasons that trigger and maintain the feeling and behavior of resentment. The one who chose to be offended or wanted to be offended will easily justify his offense.

Why did you tell her this? Why did not you tell me? And anyway, how do you talk to me?

In many friendly relations, resentment is the main instrument of pressure on each other, and in case of disagreement, everyone is in a hurry to be offended in order to put the other before a fact and resolve the issue in their own direction.

Often those who are used to being offended and not used to thinking are also offended. Patterned thinking and narrow-mindedness are the father and mother of typical insults. For a thinking person, in case of resentment, it is imperative to figure out whether the resentment has a basis and whether there are better ways of responding than resentment↑. However, how many are seriously ready for such an analysis? While people do not know how to think themselves, others help them in this, offering simple rules and recipes. They already explain to children what can be offended, and what is impossible and stupid, detailed instructions are somehow conveyed to boys ↑ and girls ↑: what girls (for example) can and should be offended by, but what makes no sense. Like any recipes, they are a manifestation of narrow-mindedness and will never replace real experience and even quick wit, however, at certain life stages, these substitutes for real emotional (or social) intelligence are indispensable.

Unfortunately, intelligence is not everything. The most intelligent and healthy person may someday hear something that will hurt him, hit a sore spot in his soul. We all come from childhood, and in childhood we were often unprotected, and we ourselves liked to be offended. And today we can win it back. Negative anchors trigger the experience of resentment even when everything is clear with your head, when you don’t want to be offended — but the experience starts by itself … It’s good, however, that if a person has a head on his shoulders and internal benefits do not support the experience, such an experience is short-lived. This is a trifle, it goes away on its own.

The strength of the experience is an important point in determining how to work with resentment. Grievances are small (very little touched the soul), serious (the soul was seriously hurt) and old (serious, stuck and entrenched in the soul) — working with these types of grievances is a little different.

Minor grievances and misunderstandings

Sometimes we get offended just for nothing. Young people and girls are specially told when it makes sense to be offended, and when it is stupid — maybe it will be interesting for you too. If the offense is petty, it is best to ignore and forget. The less attention she gets, the better. Start working with it seriously, analyze its causes and benefits — it will only grow. And if you notice: “Hmm, even a little insulting! Well, okay, it will pass!” — and get busy, then soon everything will naturally be forgotten. “Well, someone spat in the wrong place. Uther — and the trouble has passed! See →

Serious resentment

If the offense is not petty, the soul is seriously hurt and the soul hurts, you can work with the offense in different directions. First steps: turn on your head and stop winding yourself up, understand the rightness of the other side and look at the person positively, look for the reasons for resentment and think about how you can discharge yourself from physical stress. See →

old grudge

​​​​​​​Many people remember the grievances inflicted on them for a very long time. They have already parted with a person, but resentment lives in the soul, does not go away for weeks, months, or even years. If this is your case, it’s not great and it’s best to see a psychologist. The following algorithm helps some for independent work:

• Turn on your head and mind, tell yourself: «What happened, happened.» If the horse is dead, it must be dismounted. If you can’t change anything already, you need to work on where you can do at least something. List the things you need to do today and now.
• Distract yourself from the negative, switch to the positive. You can use anything for this: a game, a song, a chants, a prayer, the main thing is that it helps. If you have good, positive friends who do not regret and sympathize, but invigorate and set you up for business, meet them more often.
• The best way to end a grudge is to start doing something kind for the person you hold a grudge against. Think about how you can start communication with him, albeit ritual: maybe it would be appropriate to congratulate him on some holiday and some good event. If you find an opportunity to honestly thank him — do it, it will become easier for you first of all.
• If inside you often remember this person, accustom yourself to thank him for something every time. Something good you had with him: what? Thank him for this. If you can write him a letter about this, it will be great, but you do not have to send it: you are doing it for yourself.
• It will be very good if you can turn to this person for help — one that is not difficult for him, which he will not refuse. It is possible that that person will be pleased to help you, but it is important for you to learn how to accept help from him. We are all human and everyone can help someone in some way. The more often this happens, the faster people build good relationships.