#9 Resentments

 Resentments are expensive. 

They replace love with negativity and thus dilute our peace, destroy relationships and contribute to physical diseases. Accordingly, we need to have a proper understanding about them if we are to address them properly. That understanding is the goal of this lesson.

About resentments:

They appear to be about someone or something “out there” in a world that is seemingly separate from us. Accordingly, we carry grudges about people, countries, religions, corporations, politicians, ideas, etc. that seem to have a negative effect on us individually. Those sources of resentment violate our beliefs and appear to cost us money, impinge upon our freedoms, insult us and provide a host of other unwanted intrusions on our personal peace. Thus many of our problems seem to be their fault, not ours… and, it may seem, those guilty parties should pay dearly for their inexcusable acts.

Amen! (smile).

“Justice”:

It seems like “justice” is due and so we tend to become judges (and juries) so we can “imprison” these offenders by harboring resentments against them in our own minds. We cannot “let them off the hook” or condone their foul behaviors. Thus we also become their jailers and stand guard over their sins. This, of course, links us to the same prison with those we resent. It is like we are “doing time” together.

However, the offenders in this saga are usually unaware of our imprisoning efforts and thus walk freely about, innocently insulated from our arrows of injustice. Thus THEY are not “doing time,” WE are. And that leaves us, not them, with a big penalty. As any beginning medical student will tell you, negative emotions create stresses that send negative chemistry coursing through our bodies. This, in turn, eventually contributes to emotional and physical ailments of every description. So the only losers in this resentment game are the persons holding the resentments, namely, us. The offenders go free.

Dumb.

Nonetheless, it all seems so appropriate… so obvious… so undeniably valid.

So let’s explore further.

An important question:

Let me ask you a question. Please ponder it awhile because it points to an essential idea about resentments. Here it is…

If all your reasons for resentments were to vanish …I mean gone, poof, never to be seen again… how long would it take you to replace them?

One of your reactions might be something like, “Why would I replace them? Without all those irritations, I would have nothing but peace.”

Resentments are of our own making:

But alas, I suggest, such peace would not be yours. This is because our resentments are largely of our own making. They are, for reasons I will explain, of major importance to us and, until we dilute that importance with The Unseen Therapist, we will quickly replace them if they should theoretically vanish.

The reasoning is subtle, but vital to our understanding. 

Back to basics:

To explain, let’s go back to the basics of our course. At the core, we are NOT separate, even though our senses convincingly tell us otherwise. In reality, everything is connected, including us, within a Oneness of love where negativities such as anger, grief, guilt, fear and resentments are impossible. Thus love is our ultimate reality and, when we temporarily stray from that Oneness into an illusory world of separation, we develop unrests within ourselves that won’t go away until we return to our natural state of Oneness. Just as a fish will gasp and struggle when out of its natural water environment, so will we have our human versions of that when we have stepped out of our natural state of Oneness.

We project our unrests:

So, while we are out of our Oneness state, we need to deal with these unrests and the easiest, most convenient way to do that is to project them onto the outside world in the form of finger-pointing guilt and blame (resentments). In this way we can seemingly “take care of” our inner unrests by unloading them “out there.” Again, this makes all these issues their fault, not ours.

If we are honest about it, though, we can find instances where we have done similar behaviors, or thought about doing them, or know we have the potential for acting them out. Nonetheless, we would rather project these unworthy traits outward than admit their possibilities within ourselves.

Now we can see why we find it important to maintain our resentments. Without them, we would have to take responsibility for our part in the problems. Much easier, our egos urge, to throw the blame elsewhere. In essence, they “protect us” from having to look within. 

And, going back to the question I posed above, it’s also why we would need to replace our reasons for resentments if they somehow vanished. Without them, we would “run the risk” of flipping into Oneness and, if if we did THAT, our stubborn egos would lose some of their major defenses against The Unseen Therapist. So expect your ego to resist our efforts here… and don’t be surprised if your resentments take a while to fade. Persistence will prevail, however.

Note: I fully realize how difficult this reasoning may be to accept. It is clearly “outside the box” thinking and tends to violate many long-held beliefs. Fortunately, you do not have to completely believe it for results to occur. Just being open to its possibility will suffice. Belief will likely manifest as you gain experience with this idea.

Shifting our resentments – a look at reframes:

Now let’s explore how to shift those resentments toward personal peace so we can rebuild our relationships and our health. To begin, here are some additional concepts about the resentment issue that are designed to enhance our understanding and thus put more “on the table” for The Unseen Therapist. They fall under the technical category of “reframes,” a topic that will be covered in depth in a later lesson: For now, we can consider these ideas as boosts to our understanding about resentments.

1. Different beliefs lead to different behaviors: In a world of separation, it is obvious that each of us must ultimately fend for ourselves. We may have some loving support along the way but, when all is said and done, we are largely on our own. Thus we tend to compete with each other for status, love, money, food, shelter, education, etc.
   

And we all do it differently. Why? Because we are each acting on a different set of beliefs.

Sure, there may be some similarities in our approaches but we have each been fed a bouquet of beliefs by parents, teachers, coaches, clergy, peers, books, movies, TV and endless sources of the “truth” of just about everything.

And rarely, if ever, do these sets of beliefs coincide. No matter how firmly we may hold some beliefs, it is almost certain that they are opposed by at least some others. Think about it. How many people are in complete agreement with every detail of your beliefs about religion, politics, how to raise children, marriage, money or ethics? Can you name any two people who share all the details of an identical list of beliefs?

Is it no wonder, then, that others will violate your beliefs?

Different beliefs lead to different behaviors. And when they do, won’t you resent at least some of those behaviors and label them as cheating, betrayal, dishonesty, stealing or other forms of activities that work against your interests? Of course. We all do this and, if we will take the time, we can make a long list of these resentments that have accumulated over the decades of our lives. Some will be “small” that maybe we can overlook while others will be so monumentally big that any form of forgiveness is considered impossible. We might even think…

“How dare those other people behave in such deplorable ways!!! They need to get new beliefs… new morals… and new ethics that coincide with ours.” So say our egos (which, of course, are always right… and righteous). Smile.

Now, to reverse the idea, won’t your behaviors be violating the beliefs of others as well… no matter how convinced you are about “being right?” This is inevitable. You cannot walk through this illusory world of separation without someone lamenting about your “poor behavior.” That’s one of my main points. Resentments, in this world, are unavoidable.

So, chances are, you can make another resentment list, this time of people that are annoyed with YOU. Some you may see as justified while others, I’ll bet, reflect your thought that they “just don’t understand the truth about the situation.”

1. Desperate people do desperate things:  We rarely know all the details behind anyone else’s life story or circumstances. This can be true of even our closest friends. Are those you resent dealing with family problems, financial problems, drugs, diseases, pain or the lingering emotional chaos of childhood abuse? Are they angry at recent betrayals or because a child, pet, relative or friend died? Is there PTSD, Dementia or Alzheimer’s in the picture? These issues, and many others, generally point to desperation and cause people to do desperate acts. These are things we may not know about and yet, if we did, perhaps our resentments would turn to understanding and even to love. Do you behave “normally” under such circumstances. If not, perhaps you would prefer forgiveness to come your way rather than resentments. Maybe we should consider doing the same for those we resent.
   

2. Understanding, not condoning: As I indicated earlier, we tend to justify our resentments because we don’t want to condone certain behaviors or “let others off the hook.” Thus,

with this understanding, the idea of forgiveness will not even be considered. Further, if we define forgiveness as condoning or supporting certain behaviors then, indeed, some justification can be given to that position.

But, as you may recall, one of our ultimate efforts is to approach the state of True Forgiveness where we recognize that we are living in an illusion… a dream… where all of our “sins,” “poor behaviors,”, etc. never really happened. Indeed, there is nothing to forgive.

Until we truly digest this realization, however, a useful step up our Stairway to Miracles involves replacing the idea of “condoning one’s behavior” with “understanding one’s behavior.” If, as mentioned above in “Different beliefs lead to different behaviors,” we truly recognize that the behavior of others is contributed to by their beliefs, then we can shift our blame (resentment) to a softer understanding of why this seemingly inappropriate behavior showed up. THIS DOESN’T MEAN WE NEED TO CONDONE THE BEHAVIOR. We can still resist such activity but lighten up as we tend more and more toward understanding. For example, I have some compassion for pedophiles because, in my experience, they are in desperate need of love and understanding. However, until their behavior changes, I’m not about to have one babysit my grandchildren.

How to collapse most resentments:

Simple. In most cases resentments can be easily reduced to specific events and handled routinely with The Personal Peace Procedure. For example, if you resent someone because they spread untrue rumors about you, you can turn that into a specific event something like this,

“The moment when I learned of rumor X spread by [name] and I currently feel so resentful.”

There may, of course, be more than one specific event behind a given resentment and that specific event may have different aspects that need addressing. But these details are potentially present in all specific events. So nothing new here. 

Some resentments need reframing:

When a resentment is very broad in nature, such as one involving a political or religious view, then specific events are difficult to find and thus reframing is often helpful. This was mentioned earlier and will be covered in more detail in a later lesson. This is where experience and the artistic use of this process come into play.

QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES

1. Why are resentments expensive?

2. Why do many of our problems appear to be their fault?

3. Why are WE “doing time” and THEY are not?

4. What is your answer to the “important question?”

5. Create three personal examples where your resentments are projections.

6. Do you have to believe everything in this lesson to get results for resentments?

7. Create three examples where different beliefs lead to different behaviors.

8. Create three examples evidencing that desperate people do desperate things.

9. Give three personal examples where replacing the idea of “condoning one’s behavior” with “understanding one’s behavior” would bring relief to your resentments.

10. Find three personal examples of resentments that you can reduce to specific events. Then use the Personal Peace Procedure on them. 

© Gary Craig

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