How to deal with resentment

MakeURegret · 2020-10-04T01:08:06+00:00

The book “then charisma myth” has an excellent exercise on this. I recommend reading the whole book, but will give you a summary on the technique.

The technique is for when you need to get over resentment towards someone that you may have to interact with again or that’s just overall affecting your mood negatively. And it’s someone you KNOW you’ll never get an apology from (or at least not a true apology or at heart not a true apology anytime soon).

What you do is you write a letter to the person who hurt you (but don’t send it to them just write it out). You detail everything they did to hurt you, everything you hate that they did to you, etc. Then you write another letter “from them” you write it as if you were them and you have “them” respond to everything you wrote saying how sorry they are.

Then you throw out the letter you wrote to them and read the letter “they wrote” to you. Read it over and over and over again as much as you need to. Until you start to feel less resentment about the whole situation.

I don’t recommend you do this unless you KNOW you’ll never go back to that person as you’re basically tricking your brain into thinking you got an apology. But it’s helpful for those stations where you’re mad and you just want to stop being mad.

Another thing that has helped me are CBT workbooks. I recommend “ten days to self-esteem” by Dr. Burns. You may not be struggling with self-esteem or that just may not be on your priority list, but it’s a great workbook that applies to all situations honestly. I’ve found it’s very helpful in syncing up my intentions with my actions. As in those situations where: “I don’t want to be mad, and yet I can’t let the anger go!”

Title	How to deal with resentment
Author	AdrasteaRed
Upvotes	12
Comments	1
Date	September 28, 2020 6:26 PM UTC (5 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/askFDS
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/AskFDS/comments/j1hnyq/how_to_deal_with_resentment/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/askFDS/how-to-deal-with-resentment.1068394 https://theredarchive.com/post/1068394

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