…on Resentment

“It can be tough to stop resenting someone. It takes a delib­erate decision—an oomph—to turn our thinking around. For starters, it can be helpful to remember that those around us eventually grow weary of listening to us whine, even if we were wronged. There is a point where enough is enough.

We need to feel our emotions. We don’t want to get into repression or denial, but once we’ve felt the emotion, it’s time to let it go and turn the situation around. Envy and ill will can be a constant undercurrent in our thinking, if we don’t consciously seek to pluck out these emotions. It may feel like other people are constantly getting the good luck, that we have none, and that the good luck others are getting was somehow taken from us. It’s not true. And resenting others and spreading ill will doesn’t help us or improve our situation.

“There’s a lot of haters out there in the world,” a man said to me. “They don’t even know they’re spreading hate by the envious, bitter little thoughts they think.” via May 3 | Language of Letting Go.