Vineeto: You see, when you understand resentment this way, as a complaint/ blame to divert attention from ‘you’ (the only person you can change), then it may be easier to see that it is silly to maintain this automatic reaction/ habit. Focussing the attention to where it belongs, the fact of being resentment, at the time of experiencing it, the very attention allows you to be felicitous instead (it’s often not even a decision but a natural consequence, just as you stop wiggling your toes the moment you become aware of it).
Then, feeling good, you can check what is behind or underneath the frustration – perhaps impatience, or perhaps the conviction it’s your right to have a PCE now because …, or any other ‘self’-generated belief, attitude or principle. And it could be this very resentment standing in the way of allowing a PCE to happen. (see also How do I Induce a PCE and Delightment ).
Josef: Yes, I am starting to focus on this resentment and tackle it. It’s not just about this PCE, but I can see that my general approach to life is also filled with resentment. I’m mired in a world of “shoulds”; things that I have to do rather want to do. I view work like this, as well as most things besides anything that has quick gratification (e.g. playing video games, eating delicious food).
Hi Josef,
This is a great description of resentment if there ever was. However, you cannot ‘get rid’ of resentment by rejection of having one emotion and choose having another like changing black chess-pieces with white ones.
Now that you acknowledged that you experience resentment, the first thing is to stop fighting it and stop blaming yourself as well. Any battle against yourself only fuels the feelings by increasing the power of ‘you’ to make you feel bad. Personally, feeling being ‘Vineeto’ found that the moment she stopped fighting the feeling (i.e. by objecting to it), it instantly diminished. Then you can more easily get back to feeling good and from this vantage point contemplate for instance what Claudiu wrote to you (link) and what other habitual attitudes will be worth paying attention to, so that this resentment is no longer dominating your mood/ your life. Doing this, each time you notice resentment creeping in, you have a much better chance of enjoying what you are doing (yes, even working for sustaining yourself) and appreciating this moment of being alive.
It also helps to put everything on a preference basis –
Richard: I did everything possible that ‘I’ could do to blatantly imitate the actual in that ‘I’ endeavoured to be happy and harmless for as much as is humanly possible. This was achieved by putting everything on a ‘it doesn’t really matter’ basis. That is, ‘I’ would prefer people, things and events to be a particular way, but if it did not turn out like that … it did not really matter for it was only a preference. ‘I’ chose to no longer give other people – or the weather – the power to make ‘me’ angry … or even irritated … or even peeved. (Richard, List B, No. 12a, 16 July 1998)
Josef: Seems like I’m being dragged around by my life rather directing it. I desire the opposite. I want to be here, to enjoy living in this moment. But it’s clear to me that that is not what I am being at all. Even the specifics of my life don’t seem to matter much, as this attitude is all encompassing and will use anything undesirable as an excuse to fuel the resentment of being alive.
You say you are being “dragged around by by my life” when in fact you are dragged around by your feelings (like most people are). The difference to most people is that you have the opportunity to pay diligent attention to whichever feelings prevent you from feeling good, from being happy and harmless, and this very attention and awareness of being the feeling allows you to choose to being a different affective experience. It is important not to keep your undesired feelings at arms length but to acknowledge that this is who you are as a feeling being. This very awareness that you are your feelings allows you to choose to be the felicitous feelings instead.
When you say I don’t want to be resentful – “I desire the opposite. I want to be here, to enjoy living in this moment” you are misunderstanding what being happy and enjoying living means. Being (unconditionally) happy is what happens when there are no obstacles in the way for being happy. Just watch young children. They are happy and full of energy – unless something is amiss. As soon as parents fix/ provide what is amiss (change diapers, provide food, plaster on the scratched knee, etc.) their good mood returns. You can do the same – pay attention to what you experience affectively and then decline/ dissolve the obstacles to feeling good and feeling good returns. Then you take note of the trigger which brought up the obstacle in the first place and sort it out, so it won’t interfere with your feeling good at the next occasion.
Josef: Seeing all of this has been a breath of fresh air and has lifted my cynicism a little, even though I have only scratched the surface. I’m not sure when it became like this, as I was quite a happy kid. But between job responsibilities (I view work as something I am forced to do; I resent working to live), I somehow became a real downer. The sun is shining again.
This breath of fresh air is excellent – so you are looking in the right direction. Happy kids become serious adults and have to re-discover their joy of life and naiveté again. Investigate your cynicism and your victim/ entitlement mentality that someone else owes you a living (“I resent working to live”) and see how ultimately silly and self-destructive it is.
Become “a happy kid” again with adult sensibilities.
Vineeto: It could be that when you say today, almost three years after the PCE, that “it doesn’t feel “solid” or “clean” and I seriously doubt its veracity”, this interpretation may well be from ‘me’ having taken over full control again over your memory of the PCE.
Josef: I was thinking about this, and there may be some truth to it. When I rememorate the EE, there’s something to latch onto, namely those felicitous and innocuous feelings which are still affective. But when I think of the PCE, there’s nothing because I was so minimized. I don’t even know how to remember it, so I guess in my cynicism I resolved that it’s best to not even try.
I will try and rememorate the PCE. (link)
This cynicism seems to permeate many areas of your life – it will be a big change for the better when you pay close attention to it. It may have been the single-most deciding factor that no PCEs have happened for a while. Cynicism is the very antithesis of naiveté.
I wish you best of success in rediscovering your naiveté.
Cheers Vineeto