At resentment.
Having a reputation.
As the thing that often ends relationships.
And today I want to explore with you a bit of a different way to see it,
A bit of a different way that we can look at it.
In my 20 years of working with couples and individuals who are really at a stress point in their lives,
I've come to understand resentment more as a signal.
And sometimes it's like a giant neon arrow wanting to point us in the direction.
Of where we can look.
It has the body keeping score,
What kind of like builds up inside the body,
Doesn't it?
Of what's gone unspoken.
What is unmet or unacknowledged,
And that often sits for a very long time.
And maybe the reason it's so hard to move through it is that most of us were never taught what resentment is pointing us to look at,
How we can deepen our understanding instead of getting stuck in it.
So for those of you who don't know me,
I'm a teacher here on Insight Timer,
And I'm also the founder of the Family Imprint Institute.
My approach is about guiding people to trace back to what's happening in the here and now,
To back there and then,
Where the trigger,
Where the hurt actually started.
And resentment,
I've discovered,
Is one of the clearest threads to follow.
When you understand where yours began,
Why certain things feel so tender or difficult inside of your relationship,
And why the resentment has tended to build up and become sticky,
Something in our body can finally relax.
We want to look at the resentment that you can't seem to let go of and why it can feel so hard to release.
We'll explore where it actually comes from and what it might take to loosen up that grip.
You don't want to feel this way.
Life's too short to carry all this heavy resentment around.
And if the resentment won't seem to budge,
Let's take a look at what's happening.
And so Karma's added,
Resentment makes me say,
What you did to me is real.
And because of it,
I cannot be at peace.
I hope we can discuss how to find peace.
Well said.
I think that piece of whatever it was that was done,
Where we're stuck in not being able to put it down because the hurt was too sharp,
Too meaningful,
Too connected to something that happened in our past,
It can be hard to really live with that deep sense of peace.
And that's my hope that we can explore that together today.
So to Karma's point,
Resentment sits inside of us.
I like to view it like a heavy weight that can pull us down and pull us off track to having real closeness.
You know,
It's that something that doesn't quite dissolve even on the good days.
You know,
You might be laughing at something that's happened right here and now,
But underneath that,
There's still this kind of tension point.
Maybe you're even lying next to each other in the dark and sadly you feel it there too.
Maybe it's not rage and maybe it's not even grief exactly.
It's something older.
Maybe even something quieter.
Than either of those emotions and it can certainly pull us away from our own peace.
This is resentment.
And I wrote this workshop for the person who doesn't want to carry this anymore,
Who chooses their peace over what's unresolved or what's been hurtful,
Who's genuinely tried to release it.
And now it's just tired of feeling like I gotta carry this along.
And so we're going to start our time together looking at what resentment actually is,
Along with where it comes from,
Which is almost never about what actually happened.
You know,
That's a part of it,
Of course,
But the roots are deeper.
And then we're going to look at what releasing it actually requires because most of us were never taught that part and how else do we get to peace and that contentment and that sense of ease within ourself unless we know how to truly release it.
And one more thing before we begin.
If you're watching the recording of this class at,
You know,
2 in the morning,
Or you're watching it quietly so your partner doesn't hear it,
Or maybe you're even watching it together because you've run out of words to even discuss.
It's been too circular.
I hope you come away with understanding yourself and the stuck points that you've carried so much more clearly.
That's we want to shine some light on where it's been stuck and how it's gotten so heavy over time.
Most people describe resentment the way they describe a stain that won't come out.
You know,
Something happened,
Something was said,
Something was withheld or done.
And it left a mark that just won't fade away.
And resentment isn't something that just fades away with time.
You know how they say time heals all wounds.
Well,
I haven't seen it heal resentment.
Because it's a signal.
And signals don't go away if we just ignore them.
Instead,
They get louder.
I mean,
You could think about it like you've got your light on in the car,
The check engine light,
And we really want to take it into the mechanic instead of just going,
Oh,
It'll go away.
I'm just going to put this card over top of it.
We spend an enormous amount of energy.
Trying to release the resentment itself,
Trying to let go,
Even trying to forgive,
Trying to move on.
But when the resentment is actually pointing at something that hasn't been fully understood yet.
And that's what we want to dive into today.
We're not just explaining something away.
We're not minimizing,
We're not even defending against it.
That all takes so much energy.
I think sometimes,
Too,
There can be a rush to apologize and then we're not even fully understanding what got us there.
And so we're just apologizing to try to get things back on track.
But the resentment tends to hold its ground because it's still protecting something that,
You know,
The injury,
The emotional injury is connected to.
That's why if you've noticed inside of your own relationships,
You could have the same conversation like 37 times and it might still feel like nothing has shifted.
I think as we move into talking about releasing resentment,
It wouldn't be a complete conversation unless we were talking about what it's actually holding.
And so here's the version of the story that most couples might share.
Something happened,
Maybe it was something big like a betrayal or more ongoing and kind of slow drips like criticism that doesn't stop.
That distance that just keeps growing.
The promises that keep being broken.
The times you might've reached out and maybe didn't feel met.
Maybe it was one significant moment,
Or it was the accumulation of a thousand small moments that no one knew had a name out loud.
And so that's the surface layer.
And it's absolutely real and very frustrating and even heartbreaking.
And all of these things tend to build up inside of the relationship.
Now here's the pattern that I see in my practice.
We want to be able to understand what's going on underneath the surface.
And so in this example,
We could see that we've got two people inside of the relationship,
And maybe he tends to pull back when things get tense,
And she tends to pursue.
To push for a resolution,
To have understanding,
Really needing the conversation to happen now.
Now,
Neither of them are wrong about their approach.
But they're both running,
Let's call it like a script,
Or they're running from a blueprint that was written somewhere else.
And so because of that,
You are needing a response that was shaped long before this relationship even existed.
And then it gets played out in this kind of dance that is not so fun.
And so you might talk to a girlfriend and say,
Oh gosh,
He's pulling back again,
And I'm all alone in this relationship.
And so maybe we would call that stonewalling or withdrawing.
But underneath what's going on there.
And this is for many men that I've worked with.
It's an early learning that relationship conflict leads somewhere dangerous.
So maybe his father's anger was unpredictable?
Maybe his mom would become so emotional and upset that he couldn't bear it as a young boy.
Maybe the way conflict was handled in the house meant someone ends in tears or someone is on the losing end.
So maybe his body learned that going quiet was the only way to stay safe.
And so her pursuit of trying to find a resolution to him might feel like escalation of the problem.
But underneath it,
If we go over to her side,
And this is for many women that I've worked with over the years.
It's an early learning that if she stops trying,
If she stops reaching out,
That silence isn't neutral.
It's some sort of withdrawal of care.
And it has the potential of losing their relationship altogether.
There's a belief that if I don't reach out to fix this,
The distance is just going to grow.
And that's the last thing that I want.
And so what looks like a fight now,
It's about the.
I don't know,
The window left open or the money situation or about the lack of intimacy.
Now it's about two nervous systems doing exactly what they learned to do.
Kind of running this script that they downloaded.
Before they even knew each other.
Now,
This is where resentment gets complicated.
Because the resentment is real.
And the wound is real.
The needs are real.
But the wound was often there before the relationship ever started.
And now the relationship has activated it,
Kind of like revealed it.
Gave it a name and a face,
But the underlying pattern of it all started so much earlier.
And so I've been working with couples and individuals for 20 years,
And I have seen so many of these dynamics play out time and time again.
And we're wanting to look at these dynamics through a new lens so that we're not stuck on the person withdrawing or pursuing,
If we go back to that example.
But we're shining more light on the actual pattern.
What it's protecting.
Because that's where we can get traction.
That's where we can get change.
If we're stuck in blaming the person or their strategy of how to get love or how to protect from being hurt,
We are stuck in a loop.
And that's why there can be some approaches to repairing relationship that feels very,
Very circular.
And this is why I want to bring in the body for just a moment.
Because resentment is not just some sort of thought or feeling or some story you're building in your mind.
It actually lives in the body.
And I talk about it with my clients.
I actually call it a body memory or a reference point.
And so we were having this argument,
You know,
It's seven years from the last one.
But that argument from seven years ago lands right here.
And now there's that reference point coming back.
And this is where we can recycle old hertz.
And we're back in that loop.
So to bring your body into an experience,
I want you to think about the thing you are most resentful about in your relationship.
Just let it come to mind for a moment.
And notice as you scan your body.
Where do you feel it in your body?
The body holds resentment because resentment at its core is an unprocessed emotional experience.
And so as you notice,
I just want you to place your hand where you feel it.
And bring your breath into that place.
As if to say,
I'm here with you.
I'm not going to leave you alone with these tense,
Heavy,
Intense emotions.
I'm here to breathe with you through it.
We want to be able to recognize something happened that was too much to feel in the moment.
And so we can get lodged and stuck in the body.
And in many of our relationships,
Let's be honest,
It can happen repeatedly.
Without resolution.
And the body becomes like a storage space.
So let's open and air out our storage space and begin to look at how full it actually is.
When something is emotionally significant and also unresolved,
The body keeps it close at hand,
As if a part of you is kind of still open,
Still waiting for resolution.
And yet we go about the steps of the day.
We do what's expected of us.
And this is just almost carried with us like a heavy bag that's on our shoulder that we kind of forget we're still hauling around with us.
So if you've tried to resolve resentment only at the level of conversation,
As we kind of talk it through and we're analyzing it and we're trying to reach an agreement about who hurt who.
It's almost like I want you to think about it that you're on the top floor of the building.
And the ground floor,
The basement,
Has never been addressed,
Let alone the storage unit out back where,
You know,
The body is holding it all.
And so the conversation might be absolutely necessary.
And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with speaking about what the hurts are.
But what we're talking about here today is really getting to touch that deeper resentment.
Because the resentment is not in today's conversation.
It's here in the body.
And so you're going to have your storage of it and your partner is going to have their version as well.
This is also why,
For couples,
Talking about the hard things actually can make it feel worse before it makes it feel better.
Because talking about it activates the body memory.
And it connects to the original part of why we're resentful in the first place without completing it.
This is why some people that I come to see,
Maybe they've been in couples therapy for a very long time,
And they're at a fever pitch of hurt and harm.
They've just been talking,
How do I feel about this?
And we're just touching the wound,
Touching the wound,
And not being able to get to a place of release.
So when I work with couples that are deep in resentment,
The first thing I ask is not what happened,
But what does your body need to feel safe enough for this to be seen clearly?
For us to talk about what the resentment is really about.
And that might be a question that you ask yourself as you're listening.
So remember that piece that you found in your body,
What am I most resentful about?
What came into mind.
And what is this resentment that you're holding or carrying?
Connected to.
For some people,
It's just slowing the conversation down to find what it's really about and connected to.
For some people,
It's the first time they've put words to something that has been living in their body.
For some,
It's simply being able to kind of go into a space where they can speak honestly.
Without fear of their partner getting defensive or going back into the story of it all.
So here's one practical thing that you can try before your next hard conversation.
Before you begin,
Just getting your feet firmly on the floor and taking three slow,
Deep breaths to find your center.
Then ask yourself,
What do I actually need from this conversation?
Not,
What do I want to say or what do I need this conversation to give me?
More about what would I hope the outcome to be.
And to begin the conversation from that very self-regulated,
Centered place,
What do I need from this conversation?
People don't hurt each other and they don't hurt the people they love because they're cruel.
They do it because they're running a pattern.
That they don't truly understand for themselves.
And I'm not saying that that's okay and that's an acceptable thing that should continue in your relationship.
But we want to understand where it's coming from.
Because in that understanding is what creates the first crack.
In how we're holding that resentment.
And that's what we want to start to to do one crack after the other.
And so I just want to check in with you all.
How is this landing?
Do you have any questions?
You can certainly share a heart if it's all feeling aligned.
You can leave a question if you'd like to go deeper on something that I've said.
And yes,
Please do follow me on Insight Timer.
I'm a new teacher here and I do a class about once a week.
On all things relationships.
And this resentment topic is so interesting.
There's so much to say about it.
So let's get back to that.
Um.
.
.
I think if we want to drop back into our own relationship,
And of course this isn't just romantic relationship,
There could be deep resentment with a parent.
With a sibling,
With a dear friend,
Where the friendship has really changed.
But if we go back to the example of your partner,
If we look towards their behavior,
And say,
You know,
Not with a sense,
I think sometimes with resentment,
When it crystallizes,
Even in our tone,
We're like speaking from resignation.
We've got everything cloaked with a bit of anger or hurt.
And can you lean in with genuine curiosity?
And say something like.
I'm noticing that I'm coming here with something that feels old.
And I wonder how much of your old pain has come into this too.
There's a joke about,
You know,
Let's get curious instead of furious so that something can shift.
There's another crack.
In that resentment hole.
And not because you're letting them off the hook.
But because we're taking resentment out of it being personal,
And putting it into,
This is a pattern.
And I want to get curious about how to change this pattern.
And I think when we watch how your partner carries resentment towards you,
And then not knowing how to reach them,
That's got its own sort of unique distance to it,
Its own quality.
Maybe you've apologized,
Maybe you've even tried to change whatever.
They've given you feedback about And maybe you feel like no matter what you do,
That emotional debt never clears.
And so what I want you to understand is this.
Resentment doesn't release through good behavior over time.
It releases when the other person feels that you truly understand what happened and what it cost you.
Not what you did,
But what it cost them.
There's a difference between saying,
I'm sorry I did that.
And saying,
I understand that when I did that,
It hurt you.
And I know that you stayed so much longer after that was over.
And so I'm really wanting to understand your side of it.
And I sort of joke with my clients that the best I'm sorry is change behavior.
You know,
We can't just,
I'm sorry I did that,
And I'm sorry I did that,
Without really connecting it to the context and the understanding.
You know,
That second version is a lot harder to say.
I understand what I did,
How it landed,
And I know that it hurt you.
But that's what actually reaches someone.
If we remember that resentment is rooted in unaddressed patterns.
And that both people are willing to look at their side,
That's something that's genuinely workable.
I mean,
I've seen couples come back from what looked like absolute wreckage.
And the relationship didn't necessarily need to end.
But the patterns sure did.
I think we really want to do our own work first if being in conversation with the other person feels emotionally unsafe.
So I can relate to this very,
Very personally.
And my personal approach here has been to close my eyes and to visualize this person and to speak to them from that place in my inner image.
So that I'm able to say what I need to say to clear it out of my body so I'm not carrying it.
To be able to process the hurt,
To be able to understand,
You know,
What is the learning and lesson in here for me?
What is my part in this?
And being able to say what I feel is important,
Kind of like in an inner meditation,
A beautiful sacred time inside of my own body,
So that I'm not carrying around this hurt.
What is hopeful and is typically the outcome is if you do see the sibling again,
Let's say,
Gosh,
A family funeral or a family reunion or some reason to cross paths,
That there's more of a lightness to it because you're complete with what's happened.
And a big,
Big part of being in relationship with another is being complete within yourself.
I had a therapist once tell me,
Blame is the cheapest hit of power going.
And stop blaming anybody else out there and begin to look at what did I bring to this?
What's my part in this misunderstanding?
What's my part in this estrangement or resentment?
I'm guessing that resentment might be understood differently.
When relating with a loved one unwilling to see their patterns,
Which are very hurtful.
Oh yeah,
That is super classic,
Hey?
And I think,
Too,
In Insight Timer,
We're a special community because we're here committed to our own work.
We're the ones that are meditating.
We're the ones that are taking classes on healthy boundaries.
We're sort of saying,
Like,
What's my part?
Exactly what I've been talking about.
And maybe we love a parent who's not even dipped a baby toe in personal growth or read a book at all.
And so.
This is the challenge about being inside a family,
That it's not up to us,
The daughter,
The granddaughter,
The niece,
The sister,
To say,
Hey,
You should really look at that unhealthy pattern.
This makes it really difficult to be in relationship with you.
We can only do our own work.
And that's why it lands us back to this beautiful piece about what am I making this mean?
What is the sting about so deep?
And how can I be,
How can I clear my wounds,
How can I clear my hurts in order to be in relationship with my mom,
My sister,
My grandpa,
Whomever feels difficult.
I think where things get,
It's sort of like one topic connects to the other.
Resentment kind of connects to forgiveness as the answer.
And I think that is too simple and that is too fast.
Most people understand forgiveness as the moment where you choose to let go and everything just lifts and everything's repaired.
And for some things,
Some of the time,
That could be how it works.
But for resentment that's been building for years,
For resentment that's rooted in patterns that just keep repeating,
Forgiveness is not going to provide relief.
And sometimes it puts a pressure on you feeling like forced forgiveness is a must or else your relationship might collapse.
And so I feel what is a much more profound movement and that would really lead to repair is acknowledgment.
First,
Acknowledgment.
You know,
Real acknowledgement,
Not just some apology.
Not just,
I hear you.
But genuine recognition from the person who contributed to the hurt.
That they understand their part.
And that they're not defending it,
They're not putting it into a context,
It softens it.
And I think this is the place where most people skip it because it's painful.
Because it requires self-reflection and self-awareness,
Because it requires the courage to be vulnerable.
Because it's painful to sort of look at,
That's my part and I'm willing to speak about it.
And I think the person who caused the harm.
That healing power of acknowledgement is being willing to sit with the harm that's caused.
Without deflecting,
Without defending.
Resentment tends to hold on when someone says something like,
Oh,
Okay,
I'll try to do better.
Just again and again,
Or some light,
I'm sorry.
Without really intending to change.
And so this doesn't mean that,
You know,
This pattern is never going to show up again.
But it means that there's effort.
It means that there's awareness.
It means that there's consistency.
It means that when the old pattern pulls,
The person sees it sooner.
You know,
Oh,
There's that pattern again,
And does something differently,
Even if that something different is,
You know,
Imperfect.
But there's that effort,
There's that intention,
And that goes so far.
Underneath most long-held resentments,
Is grief.
It's huge.
The grief of what you hope this relationship would be,
And what it is instead.
When your partner can sit with your grief without trying to resolve it or dismiss it away,
Without getting defensive,
Without minimizing it.
Something releases,
Something that is so deep to just be seen and heard in your grief.
And this doesn't magically make the pain disappear.
But something softens when pain is finally seen.
And so even after all the right things have happened,
That real acknowledgement and genuine effort to change the pattern and sitting with and witnessing the grief,
The body sometimes can still need some time to catch up.
We want to think about resentment again like in the body and it's crystallized and held and it's got roots sometimes.
And so even if you've had this beautiful conversation and you feel a lot of the residue releasing,
I want you to know that your body might need some time to process it.
And to be patient.
I think patience is another really essential ingredient here.
What I've seen over the years is many couples might have like a breakthrough,
Like what I'm talking about,
The acknowledgement,
The focusing on the pattern,
That consistency,
The acknowledgement of the grief.
And then there's just this sense of like,
Oh,
OK,
Great.
We're good.
And everything is going to be different overnight.
And then if they find themselves sinking back,
And it's like,
Oh,
Nothing has changed.
And we miss that part where the body might need a little more time to metabolize,
To trust.
I think once trust has been shaken or severed,
It takes a long time to really rebuild it.
So give it time,
Keep showing up in that loving way,
And the body will follow.
And looking at where the pattern comes from is really what adds so much context and understanding,
Which really can soften that resentment and help us to understand what it's all about.
And so not hoping that our pain is seen,
I think the first step is to see it ourselves.
So let's say we're really resentful because our partner is so quick to criticize,
Is so quick to anger.
And we think,
Oh,
It's so intolerable to me.
And then our work would be to recognize,
Oh,
Of course,
Little Joanna,
She was so criticized,
You know,
By that seventh grade teacher.
Gosh,
Her dad was so critical,
And her mom wanted her to play the piano,
And I never wanted to do that.
And so there was critical messaging around,
Why aren't you staying committed to your piano class,
When little Joanna didn't care about learning piano.
And so the partner's criticism.
Lives in all of these body memories of me as a younger one.
And so first step,
Marilyn,
Is to see our own pain.
No wonder this is so painful.
And to be able to,
With that feet on the ground,
Three deep breaths,
What do I want the outcome of this conversation to be?
To say to my partner,
I realize or I hope that you're not being critical to hurt my heart.
But your way of relating reminds me so much of my childhood and it's super painful.
And I need to see a shift here because it doesn't feel emotionally safe to be in relationship with you.
So we're bringing our vulnerability to say,
Hey,
What's happening in the here and now,
Yeah,
It has its roots in the there and then.
And I would like your support,
Loved one,
Person I'm sharing my life with,
To not step all over this pain every day.
The need to accept we're in different stages of evolution.
And that can be some of the hardest parts when we're on our own healing path.
Because for me,
Anyway,
When I started,
I was so excited.
Oh my gosh,
I'm free from this.
And I figured this out.
And come on,
Sister,
Let me share with you,
Brother.
And they're just like,
No,
No,
No,
No.
I'm not interested in that at all.
And so at first it felt like a bit of a personal rejection.
Instead of,
No,
I'm on my path,
And they're on theirs,
And we're not in a race here,
It just makes relating to family members different,
Doesn't it?
And so that's why communities like Insight Time are where we can dive in to deep conversations like this and feel heard and understood.
That's healing in its own right.
And so as you all get ready to go back into your day,
I want to leave you with this.
Resentment that has been sitting for a long time releases through understanding.
So that sense that we talked about a little bit earlier,
Through being truly seen,
Through gradual consistent demonstration,
That the pattern that created it is actually changing.
That this doesn't have to be something that we return to time and time again.
And so I hope you take that to heart,
That the relationship might not need to end,
But the patterns do.
