Categoricalness, stubbornness, rejection of others, their freedom and individuality (in behavior) are characteristic of children, but for adults it is unforgivable. As soon as a person catches the charm of guilt from resentment once, resentment becomes almost the main means of influence. Touchiness is the immaturity of the personality.
“People of a small mind are sensitive to small insults, people of a big mind notice everything and do not take offense at anything,” – La Rochefoucauld.
Functions of resentment
Yes, you may be surprised, but the offense is not just invented. Every human emotion has a function. True, they are important in the adolescent stage, not in the adolescence period.
Signal
Resentment is always reflected in our face, behavior, words. This, naturally, is noticed by offenders. This is the signal function: a message to a partner that his behavior did not coincide with our expectations. Often, the result of the signal is a feeling of shame and guilt.
Adaptive
Feelings of shame and guilt make the adversary adapt to our expectations, which is often as excruciating as resentment.
Managerial
How do children mainly manage their parents or friends, get what they want? Right. Resentment. Resentment is a primitive, characteristic of immature individuals way of controlling people, manipulating them.
Touchy person
From childhood, our own parents teach us to be offended: “If you don’t finish the porridge, I will be offended.” Later, the child applies this in practice: scandals in the store until they buy him a toy. If parents, grandmothers, grandfathers often support such manipulation, then the resentment becomes a character trait and takes the form of resentment. The whole life of such a person revolves around the idea of ”no matter what to be offended”.
Several signs of resentment can be noted:
- cold,
- silence
- detachment,
- avoidance,
- irritation,
- stubbornness
- capriciousness.
As a rule, a resentful person has all those qualities that he takes offense at. In addition, he clearly suffers from megalomania, as he believes that no one has the right to offend him.
Loneliness is the most common consequence of resentment.
“A touchy person is a sick person. It is better not to communicate with him, ”- M. Ye. Litvak.
What to do
As always, the answers are in the person himself. You need to work not on the situation and the environment, but on yourself. To get rid of resentment, I advise you to master the concept of conscious thinking, that is, to master sanogenic thinking.
Sensitivity is often based on unconscious defense mechanisms. These are the usual, automatic reactions of a person to specific conditions. Sanogenic thinking allows you to translate these reactions to a conscious level and control them. The first thing I want to highlight is the defense mechanisms. Are they not in control of your grievances?
Defense mechanisms of resentment
Auto-aggression and anger
May be mental or physical, manifest in thoughts or behavior. Resentment gradually transforms into anger, and then into aggression, including those directed at oneself. Can you deal with anger and reduce the severity of resentment? Yes. And again, the problem lies in the desire to control the behavior and freedom of another person. The following principles will help:
- I accept another person, I recognize his freedom and independence.
- My needs are only my business, no one else is obliged to satisfy them.
- They can help me, but no one is obliged to do this.
- I clearly understand the consequences of my anger and aggression (resentment).
- I know you can’t hold back your anger. I release it rationally, thus weakening the resentment.
Self-deprecating self
It implies a person’s willingness to always be offended. If the developing urge to self-abasement goes unnoticed, then it takes control. As a result, it becomes impossible to fulfill other needs, personal growth and a happy life.
The answer, most likely, lies in the inconsistency of the self-concept. In general, such a mechanism arises from resentment against oneself for being allowed to do this to oneself. Forgive not only the offender, but also yourself. Admit everyone is wrong. Accept yourself and draw conclusions: now you have new resources, experience.
Shame is another common and related emotion in this situation. Often a person is ashamed of the very fact of his existence. It is important to find the meaning of life and understand yourself. To do this, I recommend answering the following questions:
- What should I be, how should I behave so that I am not ashamed?
- Where did these expectations about oneself come from, which do not coincide with reality.
- How realistic are these expectations?
- Can I adjust these expectations to remove the current contradiction?
- What is preventing me from making these adjustments?
Realize your own imperfections, and you can better understand and more quickly forgive your offenders. Shame is not recognizing your own freedom. He is a frequent companion of grievances.
Stimulating feelings of guilt in other people
Our offense is a guilt punishment for offenders. Gradually, people are afraid to say a word so as not to offend. The result of this tension is neurosis.
Appealing behavior
To strengthen their own position, to confirm expectations, the offended often involve a third party (support), with which it is easier to blame the offender.
Devaluation of a person
Devaluation of the offender is the most popular mechanism (“I’ll find someone else, better”). But this is only an internal disguise that does not solve the internal problem (inadequate expectations). In addition, the depreciation of situations and people gradually accumulates, as a result the whole world is depreciated.
Explaining your unrealistic expectations
A person who does not want to admit the unreasonableness of his own behavior and expectations will always find an excuse for himself: stinginess – frugality, aggression – activity, indifference – independence.
Transfer to others
Sometimes resentment towards others is caused by rejection of oneself, the transfer of unwanted personality traits to other people. Or, on the contrary, you expect “I would have done this in his place, but he is over there.” Which is what causes the wrong expectations.
So, try to avoid defensive reactions, learn to recognize them and adequately deal with situations of resentment. Two statements will help you:
- I was offended, but he is a free man and can do as he pleases.
- I don’t want him to suffer from guilt. I will survive my resentment.
Correction of expectations
Expectations are based on cultural stereotypes in society and on our personal beliefs. Sensitivity is caused by inadequate expectations. How to understand them? Answer the following questions:
- Where did my expectations come from?
- Are my expectations realistic? How much?
- What stereotypes are my expectations based on?
- Can I make them more realistic?
To get rid of resentment helps the answer to the question: “Can a person meet my expectations?” For a better understanding, put yourself in the shoes of this person.
Understanding another person
For a better understanding of others, you need to develop flexibility of thinking, empathy, get rid of egocentrism and infantilism. Learning to look at the situation from the perspective of another person will gradually make your expectations real.
The illusion of perfection
Resentment can be caused by envy, an insult to the core that someone dared to be better than us or preferred another person to us. In this case, you need to work on self-esteem and a sense of uniqueness (akin to God), to bring them back to normal.
Thus, in order to stop being offended, you need to:
- accept ourselves and others as we are;
- respect other people’s rights to freedom;
- refuse to compare yourself, your life with others (as well as stop comparing loved ones).
The result of the new thinking can be briefly presented as follows: not “Lord, give him reason, let him stop tormenting me,” but “He is a free man, probably he has reasons to do this. Can I change my expectations? If yes, then I will wait for “this and that.” If not, then this person and I are simply not on our way. “
