We all live by projecting our lives into the future – we make plans and dream or worry about what might happen. Our fears don’t always come true, just like dreams. For some time now, a magical thinking has been popular in the world that is often hidden under a manifestation of words. It encourages us to want as much as possible, without any restrictions, and to recklessly believe that with the help of the universe, our wishes will miraculously be fulfilled in one way or another. Then people are surprised that some wishes come true very quickly, while others take years to come true or never do at all.

Yes, the manifestation really works and we really are the creators of our own lives. But there is one small detail that the people making the wishes don’t even think about: we don’t get what we want – we get what we are!

Resentment prevents us from experiencing happiness and enjoying life

Resentment devours not only a lot of precious time, but the joy of life as well. Even if the sun is shining and the surroundings look like a little piece of paradise, people engulfed by resentment will sit sullenly, remembering how they were wronged and spending hours on end putting together a dialogue or monologue in their heads with the person who wronged them, asking over and over, “Why did you do that to me? What did I ever do to you? What did I do to deserve that?”

Resentment directly affects:

your relationship with your significant other,
your relationship with your parents,
your relationships with your relatives and friends,
your relationship with your children,
your relationship with the world (society, coworkers, subordinates or managers),
your relationship with life (the world, the universe, God),
your relationship with yourself.

Resentment even has a direct link to our financial situation

Are you surprised that these things are related? Unfortunately, this is not surprising, because people with a lot of resentment do not create anything. They waste tons of time and energy feeding their inner anger, so less and less of it is left for nurturing their talents and creating beautiful things and emotions, and the result is directly reflected in their wallets.

The first and most important step on the road to getting rid of resentment is giving responsibility to other people for their lives and acknowledging that we don’t know how they should live. We don’t know what our dad, mom, spouse, children or friends should be like. When we give them the freedom to behave the way they want and the opportunity to be themselves, all pretensions disappear, and with them – theoretical resentment.

Resentment is “knowing” how another person should act.
Resentment is “knowing” how everything in the world should be.

The fact of the matter is that other people’s perceptions of the world never coincide with our perceptions of the world

We are all unique. Therefore, resentment is, first of foremost, a negation of our uniqueness.

As we grew up, we learned to know. We learn to live according to patterns created by others. Our parents, in forcing us to behave one way or another, would answer the question “Why?” with “Because I said so.” And they rarely bothered to explain why it was necessary. They probably didn’t know themselves – they were just repeating the behavior patterns that were instilled in them as children.

Traps set in childhood are not immediately evident. As you grow up, the reality turns out to be completely different. Everyone has their own truth, and it is different from our truth. When we can’t accept – or don’t allow ourselves to accept – someone else’s truths and worldview, resentment is born WITHIN US.

When we don’t allow ourselves to live life according to our own inner sense

When we don’t allow ourselves to live life according to our own inner sense and try to rely solely on the knowledge we have gained of how it should be and what is right, we’re also not allowing others to live their own lives. And when other people do what they WANT to do, resentment is born within us.

When “knowledge” of how it should be and rules imposed by others gradually penetrate us from the outside, we don’t have time to get to know ourselves and our uniqueness. The only thing we know is how it should be and what is right.

This imposed “knowledge” creates resentment towards other people, as well as the desire to change them, manipulate them and transform them according to our perception of “right”. It forces us to argue with people who have a different opinion and prove our own truth – in other words, to exist meaninglessly instead of living, by wasting our precious time fighting windmills and spilling the joy of life on the way to our truth.

Author: Alma Jansen
With love!