Resentment in psychology is: defining feelings, how to fight, manipulation

In life, people tend to experience a variety of emotions and they are not always positive and pleasant. These include resentment. Most psychologists believe that it is normal to be offended, but it is not advisable to accumulate offenses, but you should try to work them out. There is no consensus among psychology specialists on how exactly to do this, since one part of them believes that the offense should be accepted and experienced, and the other should simply let go of the situation and not dwell on problem.

In any case, each person, one way or another (independently or with outside help), has to deal with their grievances, since most often they generate a whole spectrum of feelings that poison existence - fear, irritation, anger, self-doubt, anger.

The concept of resentment in psychology

Resentment in psychology is a multifaceted concept that can arise as a result of real actions of other people, as well as a kind of perception of the situation by the person himself.

For example, if a person was slandered or humiliated, then this is a real event that causes him a feeling of resentment, frustration, dissatisfaction. However, resentment does not always arise in response to any specific action (or inaction). Often a person is offended when other people do not live up to his expectations and do not behave the way they would like.

In this case, it is not at all necessary for the "offender" to behave somehow incorrectly and unethically. For example, a wife may be offended by her husband for the fact that he decided to spend a weekend in nature, and not take her to the theater or cinema. or the husband thought that his wife would let him spend the day as he planned, and instead she puzzled him with household questions.

Based on these examples, it can be seen that resentment is a rather subjective feeling. Sometimes people do not take offense at open insults, preferring to abstract themselves and not develop this oppressive feeling in themselves. But sometimes there are situations when a person takes offense at something from scratch, without obvious reasons and reasons.

Difference between resentment and resentment

Resentment is a condition, and resentment is a character trait. To experience a feeling of resentment is characteristic of all people, however, not all of them are inclined to be offended by trifles, to see negative in everything, to use this state for their manipulative purposes. A touchy person, as a rule, broadcasts such behavior from childhood, when, offended, he could easily achieve his own, get what he wanted.

In the absence of educational adjustment and internal predisposition of the personality (melancholic type of character), this line of behavior is very quickly becomes dominant in a person's daily life, especially since it helps him to draw attention to himself and satisfy his needs.

Causes

Resentment in psychology is an oppressive depressed state observed in an individual in relation to whom someone acted unfairly (maybe in fact, or be regarded in this way by human).

The reasons for the development and appearance of grievances can be designated as follows:

External component	Current events
Internal component	The wrong expectations of the offended person

External reasons can be:

• real - when really any traumatic event took place;
• imaginary - when a person thinks something up for himself or even begins to remember old events.

Internal reasons for the appearance of resentment are associated with excessive resentment when pessimistic people at any event (or memory of it) begin to demonstrate with all their appearance that they are hurt and they are very hurt. This character trait is most often associated with childhood traumas, when the child received less love or, on the contrary, did not know anything about the refusal and manipulated adults with the help of his grievances.

Components of resentment

If we consider the mechanism of the occurrence of interpersonal grievances, then the following components can be distinguished:

• existing expectations and ideas about the behavior and actions of other people;
• real actions and deeds of these people;
• matching these actions with expectations;
• the emergence of a response - resentment (the appearance of oppressive thoughts, the commission of specific actions, a demonstration of a changed attitude).

Types of grievances and signs, examples

Common signs of different types of grievances are:

• ignoring or avoiding meeting with the abuser;
• isolation, detachment, silence;
• demonstrative aggressive behavior;
• veiled statements with a double meaning, passive aggression.

There is no single classification of grievances in psychology, but conditionally they can be divided into 3 types:

• situational;
• imaginary;
• intentional.

Situational

It can arise from the collision of people with different views on life, different principles and beliefs. At the same time, the offender does not have the goal of wounding another person, he simply may very much want to prove something or convince the interlocutor. Such situations most often arise when opponents do not know how to constructively conduct a dialogue and are respectful of the opinion of another person.

Intentional

In this case, the offender deliberately tries to hurt or humiliate the feelings of another person, using offensive words towards him, laughing at him, acting unfairly. At the same time, the line of behavior is built in such a way as to hook the interlocutor as much as possible.

Imaginary

It is observed in children, as well as in adults, in whose character resentment dominates. The main purpose of demonstrating such resentment is to attract attention and subsequent manipulation of others in an effort to get what you want. At the same time, a person or a child can take offense at anything, often resorting to old situations, as well as interpreting what is happening in the present as something hostile and unfair.

Harm to the psyche and relationships

Resentment in psychology is a strong emotion, accompanied by a feeling of helplessness, a desire for revenge, annoyance, anger, despair, which acts depressingly and destructively on a person. The state of resentment, especially when it is delayed, harms the human psyche, prevents him from building friendly relations with the people around him.

Usually, the feeling of resentment in one person is reflected in the feeling of guilt in another. However, sometimes the offenders are not able to feel guilt (due to their character traits, some kind of mental illness). In this case, the offense becomes completely useless, since the object at which it is directed will not take any steps to mitigate the situation and often simply does not understand what the problem is.

An offended person chooses one of 2 behaviors:

• fierce expression of emotion;
• suppression of the external manifestation of resentment.

Both of these options for the same personality can exist either separately or alternate depending on the situation. If the first path is chosen and the offended individual decides to give vent to his emotions with might and main (shouts, behaves aggressively), then he, with on the one hand, negative comes out, but on the other hand, a lot of your own energy is spent, which is then very difficult restore.

People tend to be deeply and seriously offended not by unfamiliar people, but by those with whom they have a close emotional connection (friends, relatives). Therefore, in conflict situations with such people, you have to restrain yourself, allowing yourself to only mentally attack the offender.

This chronic state of mental aggression and resentment causes a number of disorders in the body:

• immunity decreases;
• hormonal balance is disturbed;
• diseases of the cardiovascular and nervous system develop;
• decreases endurance, efficiency;
• there is a chronic depressed mood, depression.

How does the feeling of personal resentment arise and what is it fraught with?

Resentment in psychology is a combination of anger and disappointment in someone. A sense of personal resentment develops from an attempt to project onto oneself the behavior of another person. Most often this happens unconsciously. Each individual has his own picture of the world, his own ideas about this life, which consist of his accumulated experience, patterns and stereotypes.

As a result of this symbiosis, a person can calmly accept some things and not allow others. At the same time, when building a relationship with others, he turns on the projection mechanism, when in each situation he evaluates the behavior of another person through the prism of his own beliefs. If the actions or words of the other do not coincide with the expected, then resentment may arise.

Resentment is a rather unpleasant experience and, as described above, can negatively affect health. It causes an imbalance in the work of the centers of the brain and spinal cord, affects the production of hormones, and leads to increased fatigue. Often, grievances delay and cause a constant surge of negative memories associated with the traumatic situation (especially in resentful people). If you allow yourself to stay in this state for a long time, you can lose your joy in life for a long time and lose your mental and physical health.

Psychosomatics of the emergence of feelings of resentment

Resentment in psychology is a complex feeling, consisting of anger directed at the offender and regret (pain, sadness) that everything is not as we would like. For the most part, grievances arise at the cognitive (conscious) level, and not at the emotional level. This does not apply to childhood grievances, when the child is really mistreated and offend.

But adults, having received this or that information that does not bother them, are quite able to choose how they will react to it. At the same time, someone will choose responsibility and will look for solutions and a way out of the situation, and someone will resent and withdraw into themselves.

Even if the resentment arises quite justifiably in response to injustice, then only the person himself determines whether he will take the position of the victim and broadcast it to the whole world, or he will get together and be able to cope with his condition.

Should you endure grievances?

Resentment is an unpleasant and depressing feeling that no one would consciously want to experience. But living this life without knowing what an offense is is hardly possible. In psychology, there is no guide on what grievances can be tolerated and swallowed, and which ones, on the contrary, to try to answer or take revenge on.

How exactly to behave an offended person depends not even on the situation, but on his personal perception. In any case, a pop-up feeling of resentment signals that something is wrong and should not be ignored.

If it is about the environment, then it is better to change the environment. If the problem is more far-fetched, then you can direct your efforts to working out your own perception of various kinds of circumstances and irritants.

In any case, you should not try to suppress negative feelings in yourself, as this subsequently leads to the emergence of various diseases. Many doctors associate grievances with the emergence of a number of pathologies - oncology, allergies, vascular and joint diseases, headaches. More often than not, touchy people have heart problems.

Two extreme measures that an offended person can apply are rage or aggression and hushing up the problem, resignation to it. Both approaches do not lead to the liberation of the soul from this oppressive feeling, therefore it is advisable to seek some kind of consensus and either get out of traumatic situation at all, so that the feeling of resentment does not roll over again, or delicately deal with the problem and change your attitude towards her.

Why get rid of resentment?

Resentment in psychology is, in fact, a subjective assessment of other people's actions and life beliefs. Due to the fact that someone does not live up to expectations, the victim suffers and the responsibility for this suffering lies with her.

Getting rid of them and of the very feeling of resentment is brought to life:

• peace;
• physical health;
• mental harmony;
• inspiration and new thoughts (the head is fresh and not busy with constantly toxic thoughts);
• life well-being.

Spending time feeling annoyed and angry about someone doing something differently than expected is pointless and more meaningless than before this realization will come, the easier it will be to live and calmly relate to various ambiguous situations that arise regularly.

How to deal with resentment, forgive the offender

Each person makes his own choice, how exactly he will react to grievances, whether he will demonstrate them and what is called "rushes" with them for years or will approach them consciously and responsibly. This does not mean at all that it is necessary to swallow all the unpleasant things, since in this case very quickly you can stop respecting yourself and others will also lose respect for such an individual. There are several ways to learn how to deal with resentment and learn to forgive.

Step-by-step mental work to improve the condition

Being in an offended state is important to begin with to come to a state of calm and balance.

To do this, you should mentally define step by step in your head:

• what was expected of the person;
• how he behaved;
• what is the reason for the discrepancy.

After that, you need to mentally work out the following algorithm, which allows you to take the current situation for granted and develop a normal reaction:

1. Stop expecting certain behavior from others, try not to predict their actions, relying on your own principles and norms.
2. Train yourself not to make your own mood and well-being dependent on the actions of other people;
3. Forbid yourself to evaluate the actions of another person as wrong, even if it really is.

A person who has accustomed himself to think in this way is the most protected from resentment, since he is able to accept the behavior of others as it is. Refusal to recognize oneself as perfection and ideal, to which everyone should be equal, condemnation of others and comparison real actions of people with their own expectations gives a person inner freedom and helps to get rid of resentment.

Letting go of the negative

If a person believes that he was wrongly offended, then in no case should you keep the negative in yourself. This does not mean that one should rush at the offender with fists and shower him with curses, but no one forbids just talking to him and expressing his opinion and vision of the situation.

During the conversation, you should try to find out why he did exactly that and explain what was offensive in his words or actions. After talking with him about this situation, you can immediately feel relief, and if you still manage to understand the reasons for the situation that has arisen, then the resentment can recede altogether.

Try to understand the other person

Sometimes it is difficult, but you should always imagine yourself in the place of another person (the offender) and try to understand what he was guided by when he performed this or that action. In this case, there is a lot of work on oneself, because often one's own egoism and pride do not at all allow a person to accept a different point of view and a different vision of the situation.

Looking at the conflict from different angles, you can often see that the abuser had no intention at all. to offend the opponent and the blame for everything was a misunderstanding and a banal inability to listen and listen to a friend friend.

 Take revenge on the offender in a positive way

Resentment takes away from a person his own energy, as scrolling through a negative situation every time in his head, leading to the emergence of this feeling, a person experiences many negative emotions - hatred, anger, annoyance, rage. Ultimately, all this can not only inhibit the development of a person as a person, but also lead to the development of diseases.

Therefore, instead of once again thinking about the offender, it is better to do something useful and try to succeed in any business. By doing this, one can, as it were, take revenge on the offender, because if he so wanted the victim to feel offended, then his successes would definitely not please him.

"Unsent letter"

Expressing your emotions on paper (or in an email) is a very powerful psychological technique. If the bitterness from the offense gnaws strongly, and there is no way or does not make sense to express the painful one, then you can write a letter to your abuser, but not send it.

At the time of writing the text, you should completely immerse yourself in memories and experience all the surging emotions. Then it is necessary to re-read everything written and burn the letter, while imagining how the resentment gradually fades away and the soul becomes easier.

Is it possible to forget the insult?

Sometimes it is difficult to forget a strong resentment, and it begins to eat away at a person from the inside.

This negatively affects him and therefore you should try to get rid of unpleasant obsessive memories:

• if the traumatic situation is repeated and there is no way to get out of it, the offender should be ignored;
• do not blame your opponent in return, this will only exacerbate the situation and increase misunderstanding;
• trying to justify the offender and understand his motives is a waste of time;
• you cannot allow others to spoil your mood, therefore it is necessary to suppress all conversations concerning the situation that has arisen;
• one should not submit to destructive (destructive) impulses, aggression, anger, which can prevail in the mood at certain moments. Giving your emotions a way out will not solve anything, but will only make the situation even more dead-end.

It is sometimes very difficult to forget a strong resentment. These can be difficult childhood memories, serious stressful situations in family and work life. In some cases, people find it difficult to cope on their own and in order not to poison their lives, it is better to work through such grievances with a psychologist.

How to live with a grudge against a person?

Not in all situations you can forgive the abuser. In life, complex, sometimes tragic circumstances often arise, the consequences of which lead to a complete rupture of relations. Unfortunately, in these cases, most often, there is no question of restoring the relationship. However, it makes sense to work through your resentment on your own so that the internal pain associated with it gradually fades away and does not interfere with life so much.

If the grievances are not fateful, then you should not cycle so much on your offended state. Often people sulk at each other for years over trifles due to the fact that they are very touchy by nature and do not want to make concessions because of pride and the belief that they are extremely right.

If the person is really to blame, but does not want to admit it for some reason and somehow correct the situation, then it is better for the victim to minimize communication as much as possible. Staying in an offended state for years, nothing good can be gained and this applies to all spheres of life - work, family, friendship.

Psychologists believe that resentment is the result of unjustified expectations, when one person is sure that another will act as he sees it, and he does it in a completely different way.

This dissonance leads to misunderstandings and disagreements. Resentment should not be silently swallowed, but you should not behave aggressively either. They should be taught to forgive. If a person does not have the mental resource to forgive the offender, he must still work through the grievances. inside yourself and letting them go, as they take a lot of energy and lead to the development of a whole series diseases.

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