my take on grudges

welcome to introspection ft. harsehaj! ⭐️ i’m harsehaj, a 19 y/o always up to something in social good x tech.

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onto today’s topic: my take on grudges 🗝️ 

you can be aware or wary of someone’s actions if they’ve wronged you, and that’s not holding a grudge.

grudges come into play when you’re constantly holding actions over someone’s head and going out of your way to spread that narrative. naturally, i was digging myself into a deeper rabbit hole on a psychology of holding a grudge, and i stumbled on a very simple example that illustrated this distinction very clearly.

let’s say a random stranger knocks over my drink. 🍹 telling everyone i encounter that he’s a campus villain or drink menace is holding a grudge. holding my drink tighter whenever i see the guy and accepting that his future actions are his own moral baggage to carry, and not mine, is forgiveness. you can forgive, and not forget.

a lot of us, myself included, feel guilt for holding a grudge and not completely forgetting when someone’s actions have hurt us. something i’ve recently internalized is that you are allowed to carry both wariness and forgiveness in your heart simultaneously. to not protect yourself from someone’s recurring actions would simply be naivety. 🤷‍♀️ 

maybe you disagree, but i don’t think keeping someone’s past behaviour in mind when interacting with them constitutes holding a grudge. once you charge those interactions with malice or anger, however, that becomes a grudge you’ve been holding for quite some time — perhaps something to take time to heal from. :)

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