tell 'em why you mad son

Resentment: (Merriam- Webster) A feeling of anger or displeasure about someone or something unfair.

(Urban Dictionary) When you take the poison and expect someone else to die.

If someone you were close to constantly asked you to do something that you felt was unfair, that would make you feel some type of way right? Congratulations, that “feeling” is called RESENTMENT. I think many of us have felt some level of resentment at some point in life, especially if you were in a situation where you felt as if you were treated unfairly.

A few weeks ago, I had a small BBQ at my house, nothing major, just a few close friends. Everything was good. Everyone as laughing, hanging out, drinking, having a good ole time. Until things went left very quickly. My friends had only been over for about 20 minutes before things began to go downhill. I mean, we hadn’t even put the food on the grill yet before the drama began. This is what happened….

Everyone was sitting on the back porch playing dominoes, except one person, a friend of mine who I’ve known since forever. She excused herself and decided to go sit in my house, alone. After our first hand of dominoes was over, I went in the house to check on some food in the oven. To my surprise, my friend and her husband were packing up everything they brought with them. I quickly asked, “Oh, are you guys going to the store or something?” as I stood there in disbelief. My friend replied, with a slight quiet attitude, “No, WE are going home.” Now at this point, I’m in complete shock because nothing, to my knowledge, had happened. No one had argued, yelled, fought or anything. I looked at her husband and noticed that he was looking down at the floor, like a big kid who had just been punished. As I began to try and figure out what was going on and explain to my friend that they couldn’t leave yet because we hadn’t even put food on the grill, she interrupted me. “It’s not because of you, and I’m sorry to just leave abruptly, but I’ve been sitting in here for the last 15 minutes by myself because certain people were on the porch smoking. WE are going home.”

Anyone who has been in a serious committed relationship, or have been married knows that when you are with someone, certain decisions are no longer yours to make. Certain decisions are based on you two as a “unit”. In this case, my friend was forcing her husband to go home because of the actions of HIS best friend. This is where I became upset. But I let them leave, seeing as there was no way I was talking her out of her decision anyway. They quickly made their exit without speaking to anyone else and I was left to explain what had happened to the other people at my house.

Now, for the sake of making a long story short, let me get to my point about resentment. As I tried to explain to my friend, you cannot constantly force people to choose between you and something else and expect them to NOT feel a certain type of way after a while. My friend made her husband choose between her and his best friend, and ultimately my friend held her husband responsible for the actions of his best friend, which was not fair at all. Making someone choose all of the time becomes very wearing, and can lead to that person feeling like their opinions don’t even matter. Eventually, the person that you are always forcing to make choose will begin to hate you for constantly making them do so.

Just think about it. Would YOU like it if someone was always forcing you to choose between them and something else? Probably not.