PERSONAL EXPERIENCE
What’s Something You Wish You’d Never Felt?
How feelings of resentment prohibited me from living a happy life.
“Guilt, regret, resentment, grievances, sadness, bitterness, and all forms of non-forgiveness are caused by too much past and not enough presence.” — Eckhart Tolle
- The Stains of my Past
- Rotting from the Inside
- Taking out the PoisonThe Stains of my Past
It wasn’t until my father passed that I accepted and understood the full consequence of resenting others. I spent years hating my father.
I hated him for never being there and for doing wrong against my family and me. When he was alive, I never tried to see things from his perspective. He had problems, but I never attempted to understand them until after he died.
It wasn’t until it was too late that I wanted to take everything back. At the last second, I wanted to erase everything I’d ever said, done, and wished.
In my life, I have wished, hoped, and prayed for things to happen out of resentment. I have resented others for doing wrong against me and others.
I have wished ill-will onto others and I have hoped for an evil reciprocation of events.
It took me years to understand that there’s no such thing as fairness. It took me even longer to realize that feelings of non-forgiveness and anger only block feelings of love and joy.
Rotting from the Inside
These emotions hardened me in a way that I hate to remember. My actions have brought me immense shame and guilt.
To heal from this, I spent two years working through trauma and building new positive relationships within myself.
The hardest part of healing was forgiving myself.
Have you ever felt so ashamed that you wished something bad would happen to you instead?
For a long time, I waited for penance. I wanted the universe to punish me in a way that I felt I deserved. I constantly reflected on all the things I never did.
It bothered me that I never said I love you, I miss you, or I forgive you one last time. What kept me up at night was knowing that he died alone.
He never saw my family again, and when he died, I felt sad that we never got to have one more good time together. Despite all of the crappy things that happened, it pained me that I never told him the truth.
I never told him how I truly felt. I never got to say I’m sorry, and I’ll always love him, no matter how much he disappointed me.
Feelings of resentment and non-forgiveness stopped me from being at peace. A poison lived inside of me for a long time, and for years, it prevented me from healing.
It stopped me from healing past relationships, but most importantly, it stopped me from moving on.
Taking Out the Poison
Although part of me wishes feelings of resentment didn’t exist, I’m also grateful that they do. If they didn’t exist, I don’t think I’d be in the place where I am today.
I wouldn’t be doing what I love most: writing and helping others. I don’t think I’d be sharing my story and opening up about possible solutions for better living.
By working through the ugly feelings, I was able to identify the true source of my problems in life. Only by taking out the poison did I begin to heal and see the world in a different light.
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