I am someone who tends to hold a grudge. For, like, ever.
The husband has said I would make an excellent Mafia Don, because I will never, ever forget a slight. And to me, there is no difference between a real or a perceived slight - if it seems like a slight, you'd better be prepared to deal with the consequences.
I'm fun to hang out with! Let's be friends!
This, however, has made my life kind of fucking exhausting. I've never understood friends who tell me that they forgive people who have wronged them. How is that possible? How do you function without that white-hot burning sense of justifiable anger to keep you warm? How do you let the other person, who has ALREADY wronged you, get even more of an upper hand by letting them get away with it through forgiveness?
Seriously. Let's be friends. I'm a treat!
Lately, I've been thinking that maybe the non-stop anger fest needs to come down a notch. I mean, I will still be angry at douchebags, because they are douchebags [i.e., GP], but I need to rethink my immediate gut reaction to pretty much everything being a sense of being wronged. I need to stop keeping score and rating actions and reactions by some mythical, rigid table of slights and reacting to those slights as if the only response is emotional thermonuclear war.
I need to stop and reassess how I go through life, partly because of wanting to be a nicer person, mostly because it will benefit me. And I am all about me.
So I've been slowly going through these zen-type books, and I've been having a bit of a hard time understanding how you'd want to open up and look into that soft spot that your anger is covering, but I can see, in my friends who are more relaxed than I, that it's maybe not a bad place to be.
Do you hold a grudge? Or are you one of those people who can let stuff go?
PS Speaking of how awesome I am, I'm over at Funny not Slutty today, dispensing advice and being brilliant. I'd love it if you stopped by and commented. Because if you don't? Oh, man. WE WILL HAVE ISSUES.
XO
Suniverse
It's hard to move on when someone diliberately punches you in the face and then says, "forgivesies?"
ReplyDeleteI can't have a real relationship with someone capable of that cruelty. But it's different when it's an accidental poke in the eye. I can still love a dude after that.
In either case, forgiveness is mighty hard without "repentance" on the offenders part.
Ps- you are hilarious. Let's be friends.
DeleteI totally feel you on the burning anger. It's an eternal flame of rage, once it gets started. I find that it's easier to not actively feed it, when I'm feeling it. It's there, but it's not exhausting me.
ReplyDeleteI am not of the grudge carrying clan, for the most part. If you have earned it, I mean really earned it, I just cut you out of my life. Gone. DEAD TO ME. Most of the time I am all "Eh, bygones, life is too short, and everyone has their moment." But my husband. That is a fish of a different feather. He has "The List." I didn't get invited to a friend's wedding, which I was actually happy about. He put that person on HIS list. I didn't care. I didn't have to get dressed up, by a present, go to New Hampshire, deal with her crazy family. But she was on his list for snubbing me. Which wasn't a snub, her mother invited every woman she had ever played Majong with. I know how that goes. I am cool with it. Bygones.
ReplyDeleteAt least I know I can count on him to have my back.
Yup, I hold a grudge. However, I tend to hold life-long grudges over stupid shit, and let the big shit go fairly easily. Rather bass ackwards I know, but I never said I was normal! LOL
ReplyDeleteAnd BTW, I had to comment just so I could give you a lady boner. They are so HAWT.
I have a weird sort of grudgeoning process. It sort of involves just divorcing myself from whoever I'm holding a grudge against. I call it, "Dead to me". It's not that I HATE that person. It's not that I want revenge or anything. . . I guess I just sort of feel like. . . well. . . let me try to explain:
ReplyDeleteLet's say there are a million people you could POTENTIALLY meet in your life. And we know you can't ACTUALLY meet that many. Some of those people, maybe even MOST of those people, will turn out to be douchenozzles. You can't KNOW which ones are idiots until you meet them, but once you've met them, and they've been a jackass to you. . . it's time to move on to the next person on your million person list? WHY? Because the next person might NOT be a fuckup, but the person who screwed you over has already PROVED he/she IS.
You cannot meet everyone on your list. . . but once you've established what sort of person your current acquaintance is (if that person is a nutsack) move on with your life and get to that next person. "Life's too short", etc. etc.
Yeah, I'm with the "Dead to Me" crew. If you have been cruel to me, you are dead to me. I'm over it, though. I don't consider it carrying a grudge because I no longer think about it or care about it. It's over. I ended it. I moved on with my happy life.
ReplyDeleteI don't hold grudges with my husband, though. Obviously. I have to forgive him.
I'm working on it. I'm reading a lot of feel-good stuff right now and...I'm working on it. That's all I can say, really.
ReplyDeleteI have a tendency to stoke my anger while it's still white hot, then think and rethink and overthink and three times a lady think until in my mind, the scenario has been redone 984547584756 times. I always win because people who cross me are assholes and don't deserve to get away with crossing me in my mind. Over the years, I've mellowed and while I can honestly say I've forgiven some fucked up shit, I have never, will never, forever ever amen forget. I hate though how some shit resurfaces after I've said I've forgiven and then bam! hey, can you babysit for me, but first, remember how I fucked you over, then answer.
ReplyDeleteI'm the opposite of you. I tend to forgive people easily and quickly. My wife, though, damn, she could be a mafia capo. she holds my grudges for me.
ReplyDeleteI think its about how you view people. Im a people pleaser. I tend to sacrifice ego to be friendly.
I'm not a big grudge holder anymore, but that's come in the past few years. Before, if you really pissed me off, then that was it. I could walk right by you like you weren't even there.
ReplyDeleteI do have a temper though, I will become ridiculously pissed off, but it goes away quickly. I guess you could call that forgiveness. But it's probably more about forgetfulness.
Seriously, let's be friends! I'm perfect every day all the time always, so no worries about grudges with me. S
ReplyDeleteWhite hot funny, that's what. But yeah, grudge holder here too. Forgive and forget? I forget before I forgive. Am I angry at you about something? No? Sweet! Let's be friends.
ReplyDeleteWe could have ruled our crews together with fuel-raged grudges a year ago but I've been on the forgiveness train and oh honey does it feel good. The key is remembering that forgiving is a gift to YOU and in no way condones the douchtastic behavior of the transgressor. They don't have to know you forgive them...just saying to yourself, "I forgive you for not being the person I wanted you to be" is enough of a start and you WILL feel better (because you're right: SO exhausting). *steps off the woo woo soap box*
ReplyDeleteI wish I were Lori Dyan
ReplyDeleteHa! I think that about you...weekly :-)
DeleteFor the record?
ReplyDeleteForgiveness invalidates my suffering.
xo
Very hard for me too. I am more comfortable being angry than vulnerable. But it takes a toll as well.
ReplyDeleteOh my God. I'm queen of holding grudges... Cut me up on a round-a-bout? I hold a grudge. Blocked an aisle in the supermarket? Grudge. Ripped my heart out and stomped on it? Double grudge. Owe me for coffee? Unforgivable.
ReplyDeleteI tried to be a nicer, less angry person once... I don't know what happened though. I think I got bored...
I hold grudges against people who hurt those I love much more than I carry them against people who hurt me. Those who hurt a loved one are on my list forever. I may interact with them if I have to, but I will never like them or help them and frankly, would undermine them at every opportunity (man I sound bitchy here). If someone hurts me intentionally and seriously, I generally tend to either cut them out of my life to the extent possible or, if cutting out is not possible, I proceed with caution. I don't trust them or rely on them. Frankly, I try to think of them as little as possible.
ReplyDeleteI suppose I carry grudges, but I do so in silence.
ReplyDeleteWith deadly force.
Yes. I just compared myself to my dog's gas.
Anyway, I'm heading to Funny Not Slutty now.
Because I don't want you to kick my ass.
While I do hold grudges, I tend to not perceive slights where others do. I think this means that people abuse me & I'm just too dumb to notice, but it makes for a pretty awesome existence, because I still get along with people.
ReplyDeleteIf you're someone who sets out to wrong me, though - going behind my back with a "don't tell John," or spreading a lie about me, or repeatedly smacking me over the head with a shovel, I don't ever seek revenge or validation . . . the person is just dead to me. End of story. No great loss.
I get mad at people for the shit they do in my dreams:) Yep, I fear I may be a grudge holder as well.
ReplyDelete"The child psychologist who thought she had all the answers to parenting until she became one herself." www.themommypsychologist.com
Man, I hate to ruin your new found love of all people - I hold a grudge foreva too, and I think it's healthy. I look at it like this: I think I am a great friend, loyal, helpful and always have your back. I expect that to be something cherished. I don't befriend may folks, so the ones that I do I feel are privilaged. If you wrong me, lie to me, talk behind my back, whateva - it's off! I don't feel like some one like you deserves what I have to give. Simple as that. Its not so much as a grudge, as it is a mis judgement on my part for "letting you in", and now you're out. Make sense.
ReplyDeleteOh yeah. I think about past hurts and slights fairly regularly, but at this point, I really just want to move on from them. What's done is done. And frankly, I'm not perfect either and have made quite a few social gaffes.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying to focus my attention on the good and positive things people have said and done for me. It's much less stressful! :)