Resentment Defined

I find when I talk to people about resentment that the same subjects keep coming up over and ove again. Different people but the very same subjects.

First of all, people dont have a clear understanding of what resentment is. I dont know about you but when I was growing up I did not have a Father who understood the destructive impact of resentment. It wasnt a word that was used around the dinner table.

One day, in early recovery, I asked a ministers son what was the difference between Resentment and Hate. His answer:

"Same Thing".

Now many people dont think they are. I have had people tell me in NA meetings they are not the same thing.

Now, many english words have their roots in Latin, the language spoken by the Romans who conquered England and influenced all the Languages of Europe.

Resentment has its roots in the latin word Sentio which means "to feel" . Modern Spanish, a romance language, heavily influenced by Latin uses the word Sentir to mean "to feel",


Now let me use the examle of sending a letter. You send a letter. If you send a letter without postage, it comes back. Then you have to resend the letter. Resend means to send twice.


Resentment has the same roots and means "to feel twice".

So somebody inflicts an injustice on you and you get mad.That is Anger. However if you think about the injustice again later (the next day,week,or year) and you get angry again, then you have felt it twice. Get it? Resentment equals feeling anger twice. Some people define it as anger revisited which I think is a pretty good definition.

So if someone has wronged you and you are stil angry about it, you have a resentment. Some dictionaries define it as bitteness. So resentment is a kind of anger, often very subtle and of long duration.


The Merriam Webster dictionary definition of Resentment is:



Main Entry: re·sent·ment
Pronunciation: ri-'zent-m&nt
Function: noun
: a feeling of indignant displeasure or persistent ill will at something regarded as a wrong, insult, or injury
synonym see OFFENSE


If you look up the word resentment in a the Merrian Webster Thesarus you will see the word Grudge. If you look up the word Grudge you will see the word enmity. If you look up the word enmity you will find the word HATRED.




All these are listed as related words.
condemnation; offense (or offence), umbrage; complaint; peeve, pique,hate, hatred, loathing; vindictiveness, virulence, vitriol; alienation, disaffection, estrangement; abhorrence, aversion, repugnance, repulsion; disgust, horror; conflict, coolness, friction, strain, tension; discord, unfriendliness; malice, malignancy, malignity, spite, spitefulness, venom


If you go to www.thesarsus.com and type in the word resentment you wil get the following;


acerbity, acrimony, animosity, animus, annoyance, antagonism, bad feeling, bitterness, choler, cynicism, displeasure, dudgeon, exacerbation, exasperation, fog, fury, grudge, HATE, huff, hurt, ill feeling, ill will, indignation, ire, irritation, malice, malignity, miff, offense, outrage, passion, perturbation, pique, rage, rancor, rise, spite, umbrage, vehemence, vexation, wrath


So I hope I have given you a better understanding of what Resentment is. Its really UNFORGIVENESS.Its that feeling of hostiliy,sometimes subtle, you revisit when you think of the past wrongs of others.

It is bitterness, a grudge, and hatred. It is all those things.