🙊Can You Forgive & Forget🙈

Forgive and forget is advice that has been passed down through generations. But is it as easy as it sounds? Forgive? Maybe. Forget? Never.

Grudges Are Like Inexcusable Crimes. Science tells us that holding onto any kind of negativity hurts our mental and physical health and our happiness.

Negative emotions, such as “anxiety, anger, sadness, and stress are closely associated with unhealthy behaviors, such as poor diet, smoking, excessive drinking, physical inactivity, and social isolation,” factors which can lead to heart disease, cancer, Type 2 diabetes, addiction, and dementia. Hostility and anger, in particular, are often linked to heart disease.

There are no upsides to holding onto negativity, but despite this clear logic, we often refuse to let our grudges go. Is it that we’re taught to be vindictive or is it inherently in our DNA?

As humans began to rely more on each other for survival, they also became more inclined to identify and punish those who betrayed them. And so a ‘dark’ side of human nature was born.

Eventually, these “moral disputes motivated by broken trust and a sense of betrayal became more frequent and motivated early humans to put distance between them and their rivals.

Individuals would leave their communities in search of new allies in distant places. Lacking many choices, these early humans who had once lived comfortably in the grasslands and open woodland in Africa and Asia were suddenly forced to migrate to more “distant, risky and inhospitable areas” into Northern Europe or across the sea to Australia and the Pacific islands to stay out of harm’s way.

This research illustrates how resentment played a pivotal role in growing and developing the world’s population, cultivating an evolutionary trait vital to our survival.

However, it doesn’t answer one, basic yet important question.

Why do grudges make us feel so good?