Resentment: Why Can't I Let It Go?

We like to think we’ve let go.
We meditate, pray, or smudge the air and say we’ve forgiven - but inside, something still stings. That quiet bitterness that resurfaces when we remember what they did, what we lost, or what was never acknowledged.

That’s resentment - and spiritually, it’s one of our most honest teachers.

Resentment isn’t proof of failure; it’s proof that something inside us still longs to be seen, validated, and understood. It’s the body’s way of saying, “I’m still not safe.”

We replay the story again and again, not because we want to suffer, but because we’re trying to regain mastery over a moment that once left us powerless.

Resentment is what’s left when a boundary was crossed, a need was not met, and accountability never came.

It’s the residue of wanting fairness where there was none.
And no matter how spiritual you are, no amount of “love and light” can bypass the body’s need to feel safe again.

It’s our nervous system thinking: if I keep replaying it, maybe I can fix it or solve it

The Energetic Root of Resentment

Resentment is energy in motion - or rather, energy that’s been frozen in time.
It’s like an energetic debt, a place where your spirit keeps sending power to an old wound, waiting for it to balance itself.

The more we resist it, the tighter the cord becomes. The moment we meet it with awareness, it begins to dissolve.

But awareness isn’t just mental - it’s physical.
Every replay floods your body with stress chemicals like cortisol and adrenaline, keeping the past wired to the present. The chest tightens, the jaw locks, the stomach clenches. The body remembers what the mind tries to forget.

The work isn’t to “get rid of” resentment - it’s to bring light to where the energy has stagnated, to remind the body that it’s safe now, that the story has ended even if the feeling hasn’t.

Underneath every resentment is grief - grief for what should have been different, what we gave that wasn’t valued, what never came back to us.

We often confuse forgiveness with avoidance, trying to rise above pain before we’ve fully felt it.
But the reason we can’t forgive is because we haven’t fully grieved.

Sometimes what we call resentment is really just unprocessed sadness - the ache of unmet needs and unspoken truths. Healing doesn’t come from trying to be “spiritual” about what hurt us; it comes when we allow ourselves to feel it - to let the emotion move through without judgment.

The emotion itself is the medicine.

My Own Dance With Resentment

After my husband passed, I carried resentment so heavy it felt like it lived in my bones.
Resentment for his addiction.
Resentment for the double life he hid.
Resentment for the ways I had to hold everything together alone.
Resentment for the truth I had to clean up and explain.
Resentment for loving someone who hurt me so deeply.

And the hardest part was knowing there would never be closure.
No apology.
No accountability.
No conversation where we could finally unravel what happened.
Death sealed every unanswered question in place.

So the resentment stayed.
It stayed because my body didn’t know where to put the pain.
It stayed because grief and betrayal were tangled into one knot I didn’t know how to loosen.
It stayed because part of me still wished for a version of him who could take responsibility, even though I knew that moment would never come.

Over time - through sound healing, breathwork, subliminals, somatic healing, writing my book, and allowing myself to feel instead of spiritually bypass - I learned to loosen its grip. I learned to let the resentment dissolve not through forgiveness of him, but through returning compassion to myself.

But I won’t lie.
Resentment can be sneaky.
Even now, years later, it can rise like a ghost - not to haunt me, but to remind me of a place where my heart still holds tenderness.
And when it appears, I no longer shame myself.
I greet it like an old visitor delivering a message:
“There is still something here that wants to be seen.”

This is how resentment transforms - not through force, but through presence.

The Shadow Side of “Love and Light”

Too often in spiritual community I've seen that staying unbothered, that “letting go” means pretending you don’t care. Just throwing love and light on it, but this is just "forgiveness" confused with repression. 

But real forgiveness isn’t passive. It’s an energetic decision to stop letting the wound run your chemistry.

Resentment lingers when the part of us that was hurt hasn’t felt heard. When you try to move on too quickly, your body stays behind, still holding the charge.

Spirituality isn’t about floating above your pain - it’s about grounding deep enough into your body to meet it with truth.

Transmuting Resentment - From Pain to Power

You don’t get free by replaying it - you get free when your nervous system learns it can feel safe without the need to win.

Freedom doesn’t come from fixing the story, but from rewriting your body’s relationship to it.

Try this:

• Speak it aloud: In a private ritual, say, “I release the energy of waiting for you to take accountability.”

• Write a letter you don’t send: Let the truth pour out without censorship or performance.

• Move the energy: Through sound, shaking, breathwork, or tears - let the body finish what it started.

• Shift the question: From “Why did this happen?” to “What truth in me is this showing?”

Letting go doesn’t mean you excuse what happened - it means you no longer let what happened run your body’s chemistry.

Resentment isn’t proof you’ve failed spiritually - it’s proof you’ve felt deeply.

When you meet your bitterness with honesty instead of guilt, it alchemizes into wisdom.
When you meet your body with compassion instead of judgment, it finally exhales.

Forgiveness isn’t something you force - it’s what naturally happens when your body realizes the danger has passed.

Spirituality isn’t about pretending we’ve let go.
It’s about being brave enough to face the places where we still hold on - and love ourselves there, too.

And I say all of this not as someone who has mastered resentment, but as someone who has wrestled with it in the deepest, most complicated way. After my husband passed, I carried a resentment that felt impossible to name - because there would never be a conversation, never accountability, never a moment where he looked me in the eyes and acknowledged the hurt, the betrayal, the double life, the ways his choices reshaped mine. 

There would never be closure, at least not in the way we imagine closure to look. And so I learned that some resentments don’t dissolve in dialogue; they dissolve when we decide to stop carrying what can no longer be resolved. I’ve done the work that forced me to look at every shard of truth I once hid from myself. 

And still, sometimes, resentment sneaks back in, testing my growth, reminding me I’m human. But now, when it surfaces, I don’t shame myself. I meet it, I breathe with it, and I remind my body that I’m living a life he didn’t get the chance to heal with me. I remind myself that release is a practice, not a single moment. And I know that when the day comes - because I know it will - when my book is published, or when my healing work reaches the people it’s meant to reach, most will see a “success story.” But I’ll know the deeper truth: everything I’ve built is rooted in the quiet, unglamorous alchemy of facing my resentment, grieving what will never be fixed, and choosing again and again to free my own spirit.

If you’re moving through your own version of this - your own ache, your own unfinished story - I hope something in these words reminds you that you’re not alone, and that your healing is not only possible, but sacred. Sending you all so much love.... 

X, 

Jean 

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