Anger, RFesentment, and Forgiveness

Anger, Resentment and Forgiveness

by Amara Magomola

INTRODUCTION

Anger and resentment is the reason why many addicts find themselves struggling with recovery, stepwork, and in some cases finding themselves relapsing. In active addiction dealing with such strong emotions was what was considered to be incorrigible task for various reasons i.e. then learned conditioned manner in how to deal with anger from our parents, the lack of positive consequences that was given to the addict when we attempted to take responsibility for feelings and emotions, the fact that outside of therapeutic conditions and self-help books there has been little to educate people on dealing with resentments, and due to the neurology of the addict with or without other mental illness and personality disorders anger is that more complex to handle. Being in treatment afforded many addicts the opportunity to learn to deal with conflict and their inability to tolerate a diversity of people and therefore conditions and yet even when the addict has left treatment; the addict will constantly fight his anger issues on a daily basis sometimes losing the battle. However, the addict has learned that in life we often lose some battles and win some battles but we never have to use that as an excuse again to pick up that beer, crack pipe, gambling chip, or that cheesecake to soothe the so-called ‘wounded soul’.

Resentments are more than just ignored anger. Sometimes resentments may come from being constantly feeling offended, betrayed, unacknowledged, underappreciated, jealousy, envy, among so many other states of perspectives. Ultimately, resentment is the perception that the addict has been treated badly and this reasoning is not always based on just or rational thinking. Resentments is a selfish attitude that can often be corrected by the addict becoming willing to understand another person’s point of view and/or relate to what the other person could be going through to make them act in the manner they did where the addict felt offended, betrayed, unrecognized, etc. When the addict can learn to get out his head out of the sand momentarily and learn to clear his negative emotions and perceptions about the person or situation, he will effectively assert his way out of having the burden of a resentment that will only carry weight on his shoulders that have enough to deal with at any point in the addict’s recover

Forgiveness is always considered to be the most difficult task for the addict and is not always true as it can have been formed from his sensual imagination that tends to dramatize even the simplest things. The addict must realize that there is a lot to be forgiven for because he has broken trust and that is something that can eventually be healed although it takes much work. However, regarding the addict’s own anger of those he has been harmed by and the resentments he has built by others is that he must first become willing to forgive. Prayer and meditation for the things to his Higher Power will prove to be fruitful if he truly believes that there is a power higher then him who can provide him with the preference to choose to be the better person to refuse to hold on to the pain and anger. When the addict begins to see that the pain of staying angry is stronger than the fear of letting go of the pain, a power greater than him will find a way of creating situations and sometimes the word to make amendments possible. Sometimes the addict may have even forgotten why he was angry in the first place yet the guilt and the shame of causing malice by vindictive behavior will force the addict to find ways of asking forgiveness from the person or by his Higher Power.

ANGER

The four factors that are associated with an angry, aggressive child are “1) a child with a hyperactive, impulsive temperament, 2) a parent who has negative, critical attitudes towards the child, 3) a parent who provides poor supervision and permits the child to use aggression as a means of gaining power, and 4) a parent who uses power-tactics (punishment, threats, and violent/loud outbursts to get their way” (Olweus, 1980). When an addict grows up under these conditions, it becomes difficult to realize that he is an angry person as he gets older. By the time treatment centers admit addicts, they are usually in denial of their anger issues and go about deflecting their anger by pointing out about how other people are making them feel this way. More to the point, when an addict relies on anger to either get what he wants or to defuse a situation, he can find himself become unknowingly addicted to the anger.

One of the characteristics of addicts is self-hatred and when anger is denied by the addict, he can actually harm himself more than he hurts other people. Some addicts are more inclined to be passive and bottle their anger for so long that by the time it comes out they do not know how to handle the inner pain that this anger has created. Cutting and other self-mutilation activities become an involuntary reaction. This inward aggression often needs to be treated more serious as it may be as a result of a mental illness or personality disorder. Any criticism that comes in the way of this addict no matter how constructive it may be will be heard as an attack for the addict and instead of being able to respond with outward aggression; the addict will turn the aggression inward and do everything in his power to alienate others by being tactlessly rude or say some of the most cruelest things to himself and laugh it off in front of other people. This behavior tends to scare others from him or become even more malevolent.

With the latter behavior of negative humor towards himself, the addict may be confused that others find him morbid or intimidating to be around which makes the addict only more full of self-pity that he may even hate himself only more for. This behavior may have come from being brought up by a family, school, and/or neighborhood where he was constantly put down or played off as ‘the joke of the community’. As a child, he may have enjoyed using this role for whatever manipulative purposes but subconsciously hated it. This, and any form of self-hatred, is really conscious but there may be a lack of awareness of the connection between the self-criticism and whatever undesired emotions that are welling up inside of him that will inevitable create aggression whether or not the addict takes it out it on someone else or himself.

Anger can eventually mount into hate after a long time under such conditions as having to interact with people that the addict dislikes or finds confrontational, having a strong negative passionate feeling that seems to have satisfying reasons (i.e. propaganda, stereotypes, etc.) to justify the emotion, and eventually having the need to action out on some kind of denouncement of hating the person or idea. When an addict comes into treatment, he is already involved in his own delusions either from paranoia, self-hatred, or because he feels that he has been maltreated by society as a whole (or a certain sector of society) due to what he is (race, creed, status, and even addiction). Therefore, by the time the addict has come into treatment he is quite ready and willing to act out on his anger to the first person he feels threatened by, feels they fit into the ‘stereotyped-to-be-hated-party’, and/or has hit such a rock-bottom that he is generally self-destructive.

RESENTMENT

Resentment has many causes behind it but ultimately it is the unwillingness of the addict to deal with the negative emotion that has been created at the time and waiting it for it to boil into a place where the pain, betrayal, jealousy, etc. is uncontrollable leaving the addict to feel powerless. Any resentment that has been not dealt with accordingly can lead to more than just using or a relapse but can manifest into health and emotional problems. Some resentments have caused high blood pressure that can lead to a stroke or cause such delusions may create such intense paranoia that a person who suffers with certain mental illnesses can find themselves having an unnecessary panic attack. Resentments can ruin important relationships in the lives of addicts causing friends and lovers to cut contact with them or having family leaving them to go on without them. Yet, there are some resentments that have left the addict as a victim particularly when it there is betrayal involved.

“Social cognitive research has amply demonstrated the power of such theories to influence people’s perceptions, judgments, and memories, both of relationships in general and of their own relationships in particular. Relationships structures include beliefs about the importance of various aspects of relationships such as passion and intimacy rules about proper conduct within relationships and expectations about how partners will (or ought) to behave toward one another.” (Fitness, Betrayal, Rejection, Revenge, and Forgiveness: An Interpersonal Script Approach, 2001).

When these ‘rules of conduct’ for a relationship are broken a causes the resentment where the addict struggles to rectify and has a tendency to take into their next relationships; for example, regarding friendships when a person feels that their privacy has been invaded, they are being criticized by their friend in public, or their confidences are being broken the addict will feel betrayed. The addict will use these betrayals to become vindictive often by spreading malicious gossip, finding ways of acting the personal character of their once-friend publicly, or using their friend’s secrets at their personal devices especially in an argument. Or, in a intimate-romantic relationship betrayal can be seen when someone that the addict has considered ‘damaged-goods’, being friendly with a critical family member, or not volunteer adding around the house. Again, instead of dealing with these resentments in a rational manner, the addict would prefer to rather avoid intimacy and affection towards their partner, sabotaging relationships that their partner holds dear, and other such wild actions.

These reactions to betrayal pours more poison into a situation and as much as the addict would like to think that he is getting back or causing equivalent harm (or more) to the so-called betrayer, he is both looking foolish and hurting himself more in the end. Other subliminal reactions are the behavioral type via body language. Some addicts prefer the silent treatment thinking that getting back at the person by non-communication is effective will eventually make the addict feel alienated and isolated thereby causing self-pity. Other forms of body language would be making faces or moaning when the person comes in or out of the room giving the obvious impression that his presence is not welcomed. Eventually, the person will confront the addict who will naturally use ignorance and thereby creating turmoil in the relationship to the point where the person will give up. Whether it is by saying ‘nothing’s wrong’ when asked or toying with sarcasm, these behaviors are not just childish but they are all forms of passive-aggression that will result in a conflict or complete estrangement which will cause the addict further anguish.

“The initial discovery and experience of betrayal goes beyond the mere cognitive awareness that a violation has occurred. The pain and hurt are amongst the first and most acute emotional reactions to the awareness that one has been betrayed supporting the central argument that betrayal implies rejection and relational devaluation. Such appraisals, along with perceptions of unjustness and moral ‘wrongness’, reliably elicit anger in most relational contexts”. (Fitness, Betrayal, Rejection, Revenge, and Forgiveness: An Interpersonal Script Approach, 2001). Thereby, from a subconscious level as well as the distorted cognitive behavior, the addict will always provide vindictive and backstabbing manners in dealing with his resentment and will find in the end (‘after the smoke has cleared’) that he had misperceived the event and his behavior was shameful and incomprehensible.

FORGIVENESS

Before the addict proceeds to ask for forgiveness, he must be very careful as there is a fine line between apologizing to someone because one actually is feeling sorry and doing so they can have restitutions made out simply so he can be free of guilt. That is why when an addict looks into Step Nine “making amends to those we have harmed except when to do so will cause harm”. Confession and asking for forgiveness is often confused with addicts and if one is doing the former, he will only cause more harm and therefore destruct more people’s lives while doing so. For example, if an addict has had a sexual affair with a person who is engaged and then a few months or years later suddenly is in the position to confess to the woman; she will be alarmed and it will only cause distrust (and a possible ruining of a relationship).

One must never be naivë when he is going about asking for forgiveness. Coming clean can be seen as a manipulative, dishonest, and selfish as it is merely only easing culpability for the addict. In fact, if he the addict’s only intention in an apology is to provide relief that the addict no longer has to carry either the guilt or the shame of doing the behavior by his lonesome; this would be a wrongful and he actually is merely acting out on his addiction than anything else. The addict must be aware that he is putting the burden of the guilt and shame onto someone else and therefore ‘passing the buck’ to an innocent person when confessing an act that he is unaware of and this person will go to the oblivious ‘innocent’ which now has infected a random party.

Forgiveness of someone harming you can be done by prayer and meditation as mentioned but when one is working the spiritual principles effectively; he can find the ‘purifier’ to make amendments tremendously easier. For example, using tolerance and understanding will provide an emotional buffer when another person appears to be rude, inconsiderate, insensitive, or abrupt to the addict as the addict will first respect that the world does not revolve or evolve around him. Therefore, there is so much going on in other people’s lives and it is possible that the person may simply be in an emotionally vulnerable state. Addicts must also become willing to let go of their principles or at least recognize that people have their own standards therefore in many situations their will be a conflict of principles. The addict must learn to become flexible or pardon others.

Forgiving another person is the greatest and most valuable gift that the addict can do for himself and another person. When he has forgiven another person he has set him free in his mind and body to not have the obsession and preoccupation of perpetual harm (rational or irrational) to forever burden to him. The addict has also, unconsciously, freed himself for causing any known or unknown harm to the other person or the relationship especially if he is willing to make amendments by changing his behaviors and his perception of everything. Changing perceptions is the most important part of making amendments because when the addict does that, he will never have to relive making the same hurtful remarks or being vindictive as he will first realize the emotional upset he has caused for the other person as well as the relationship. Secondly, changing perceptions will also learn about the actual social perceptions so he can avoid doing this behavior to someone else. Therefore, forgiveness and changing perceptions will inadvertently assist in removing defects of character and shortcomings.