We are Big on Holding Grudges in this Family

Mt 18:21 Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? 22 Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.

We have a tendency to always remember (by the way did you know that no-where does the Bible say to forgive and to forget) the ills that someone has done and no matter how hard they strive to do better, it sticks in the back of our minds and stews. Growing up I was taught not to mention it, not to talk about it, so I just stuck it in the back of my head and it stewed. Well when that pot began to boil it became -- for me -- resentment or grudges "I'm done with him", "I'll show her." Both very unhealthy. For me I have a harder time with resentment.

So back to what I was doing -- working on my own personal feelings/issues. Again, here's some stuff I read with my commentary in orange and stuff that stuck out in my head bolded. You can click on the headings for each and it will take you to the website where I found the article.

"Bad things happen to everyone. Some people are able to release emotions easily. Others find they are holding feelings such as grudges and anger. When these unexpressed feelings build up, they become resentment."


"I no longer feel resentment towards any of them."
This came from one of those spiritual sites dealing with dharma and stuff like that, but the words were calming to me. Ooohhhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

The teaching is that we can truly begin to love only when we give up our resentments.

I think of anger as being like thunder - when it is present you know it is there, and your attention is drawn to it. Resentment, however, is like water seeping into the beams. It is quiet, easily ignored, and insidious. I feel it seething in the back of my head, whenever someone who has wronged me continues a behavior, or if they ask me for assistance that I feel they do not deserve. It may be unnoticed until the beams rot and the house collapses. The resentment that I feel turns into the thunder like anger here lately. Where something just pops into my realization and I look at J**** and wonder how could you have done that to us? My main resentment strangely enough is not the alcoholism, but the fact that he does not work. He is looking for work, but in the years that we have been together, he has not held a steady job. Then when he looks at me and asks me to make myself uncomfortable to get something for him, or tells me he is tired, I blow up. This is my main resentment at this time.

In our daily life resentments are born when another person, even someone we are close to, acts in ways which we believe harm us or others, and we hold it against them. And continue to hold it against them, cherishing our spite. Cherishing, wow, what a way of looking at spite. We cherish happy moments, we cherish heirlooms, pictures of a baby's smile, and we cherish spite? That is sick - spite makes us happy? Yep, I guess in some strange way, it does. Implicitly we attribute to them a "self" that intends to hurt others. They, or at least part of them, then become the enemy, someone, or something, separate from us.

If we are not mindful of the resentments in us, if we don't learn how to reverse the process, deconstructing the evil "selves" we have created for others, the resentments grow and cause suffering both for ourselves and for those we resent. When I have my outbursts of anger, I say hurtful things to him. Instead of dealing with the resentments with anger I need to use these rules that I found at another site.

These are some rules that will help:

* never hit anyone to express your anger, no matter what the cause
* try to deal with your anger as soon as it is appropriate
* address the current situation, not the whole history of conflict
* express your anger in terms of how you feel
* do not put the other person down and
* try to come up with helpful suggestions for the future

For me, the teachings on letting go of our resentments are one of the greatest gifts of mindfulness practice. To let go of our resentments means to live without the desire to get even or to punish. It frees us to love fully.

Letting go of our resentments, however, doesn't mean to let go of our common sense or wisdom. It doesn't mean to not protect ourselves and others from physical and emotional harm. It simply means to let go of the stories we are constantly creating in which we attribute to others (and ourselves) evilness, meanness, or other inherent negative characteristics. Rather than the stories, we rely more on our eyes of compassion. We become more sensitive to the ignorance and suffering that underlies destructive (or self-destructive) behavior. Phew, pretty powerful stuff.
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Learning to let go

Choosing to let go of anger is something only you can do for yourself, not for your partner. It's never a guarantee that the relationship will improve, but it's a guarantee that - in time - you'll start feeling better. After I act out on my resentfulness, then I am remorseful and feel guilty.

It's important to remind yourself that you're not necessarily letting your partner off the hook or forgetting what happened. You're letting go of the anger for your benefit, no one else's. Just like his sobriety, he has to do it for himself. You can't make other people happy, until you yourself are happy.

Once the process has started, you may feel clearer about what you want to do about your relationship. You may have renewed energy to work at it, or you might decide that too much has happened and it's time to call it a day.
No one's pretending that letting go of anger is quick or easy, but as you gradually feel the resentment slipping away you'll find it easier to enjoy other aspects of your life and begin to see the future in a new light.
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10 Steps to letting go of resentment.

1. Approach resentment as the addictive state of mind it is. There's that addictive word again, first drama, now resentment.
2. Realize that you are using resentment to replicate your family drama and maintain a connection with those dramas, a necessary acknowledgment before you can let them go. Ahhhhh, that makes sense.
3. Examine how your resentment may come from mentally confusing people in your present life with people in your past. No J**** is not my daddy, repeat after me, J**** is not your father.
4. Acknowledge that you cannot control those who have rejected you.
5. Recognize that your resentment gives you only illusions of strength. Instead, highlight and validate your real strength and power. It does make you feel powerful and like you are back in charge when you act on the resentment, I feel refreshed, he feels worthless, then we both feel like crap afterwards.
6. Learn to identify the signals that provoke resentment.
7. Practice cognitive behavioral techniques to stop indulging in resentment. Put a thought ???? between your feelings of resentment and indulging in ruminating about them. Think before you speak. Like we learned in Bible school, the smallest yet most devastating muscle in your body is the tongue. You can do more damage with your words, than with your physical power.
8. Acknowledge your part in allowing the abuse to occur, forgive yourself for that, and make a decision to not let it occur again. As I have learned in al-anon and through my counselor, it is not my fault, and I can set boundaries, my boundary is I WILL NOT LIVE WITH HIM IF HE IS AN ACTIVE USER/DRINKER.
9. Declare an amnesty - with your family and with yourself.
10. Forgive when you can, and practice willful and deliberate forgetfulness when you cannot, keeping in mind that these acts are gifts to yourself rather than capitulation to those whom you resent.

Sounds like I need to grow up. I've been asking J**** to change and to grow up. But, I have a lot of growing up to do also. Yes, I am a responsible person, I am a dependable person, but I am not very sensible at times. This resentment/grudge holding thing is big in our family. I can think of others who are bad about it also. The resentment makes you bitter, then hard hearted. This makes for a miserable person. This is something I need to work on so that I can grow as an individual, be a good example to my three, and to move on in my life.

I like the parts about letting go of the resentment for your own self, for your own piece of mind. This isn't for him or whomever you are angry at, it doesn't mean that it is forgotten, it means that you have gotten over it. BUT, it also doesn't mean that you will be forgiving (Forgiveness -- Now that's a whole other issue) of the same actions in the future or that you will allow yourself to be placed in that situation again. Thanks for listening. It feels good to get back to being introspective.

Kristen,
I agree, in fact I believe I have said the same thing in several of my previous posts.