Letting go of Ego, Resentment & Attitude
So lately it’s been all about the “era”. The “soft girl era”, the “in my bag” era, or whatever type of lifestyle you are trying to manifest…it’s that era.
So as we continue in this solo season, I thought it would be very relevant to us if I shared some thoughts about a very specific “era”. The ego, resentment and attitude era that some of us are occupying but can remove ourselves from once we come to terms with the idea that it serves no benefit to us as we maneuver through life.
Fair warning, this entry is going to be transparent and it will have a call to action for self awareness. It is with hopes that holding ourselves accountable will prove to be an effective tactic for growth in this season.
I mentioned in this last post Signs It May Be Time For A Solo Season (Click Here) that this season was a time to reflect. A time to really do an honest evaluation of how we show up in this world and most importantly how we show up for ourselves.
Often times, some of the decisions we make that turn out to prove they are actually not going to serve us, are potentially because we were operating in ego, resentment and/or attitude when we made the decision.
Elevation Over Ego
When we operate in ego it can tend to lead us astray. We get so warped in self importance and independence that it’s very possible that we miss how our egos have actually held us back from achieving a certain level of growth in connections and relationships, including the one with ourselves in whatever season we are in.
One sign of operating in ego is being overly prideful. Personally, as someone who is fully aware that my own pride has been very prevalent in my life, here’s how I realized it wasn’t serving me…
It was keeping me from being vulnerable. Vulnerability is an emotion paired with an action that allows us to allow other people in. It allows us to be willing to let down guards and have a willingness to make peace with the fact that we are humans that are in need of help sometimes. It’s okay to need help but the reality is for some of us it’s not easy to ask for it. When we allow the ego to tell us that we don’t need anyone or anything to help us because “we got this” we are creating a narrative that contradicts the idea that we are ready to have someone come into our lives and lead us, guide us, or come into our lives and be a partner. And for someone, that inevitably is a prayer unanswered if you don’t learn how to lay down your pride when necessary. Allowing the ego to lead us also leaves room for the potential to alienate other people and create a contradiction between what we are displaying and what we really need and want. Being too prideful in everything you do can leave people to the impression that you are not capable of teamwork. Or it displays to others that we are not very capable of seeing other perspectives outside of our own.
So even though we are working on ourselves in this season of solitude, this is the perfect time to reflect on how we allow other people to play different roles in our life. Remember the solo season is about reflection and preparation. Preparing yourself to adjust the things you reflected on and identified as areas with room for growth.
Self Reflection Question:
How or in what ways has my own ego and pride had an effect on the progression in my life?
Resentment Restraints
Resentment is a huge one. Resentment shows us that we can recognize the negative emotions that are attached to experiences where likely we were treated in such a way that you wouldn’t have ever treated another person. Resentment is the response to a person’s choice they made that ultimately had a negative impact on us. As we are operating with resentment in our hearts we will feel a lot. We will feel anger, frustration, disappointment, bitterness and hard unresolved feelings towards another direction.
And sometimes when we bottle resentment in, we are actually harboring those feelings that need to be heard and acknowledged. The feelings that we believe we need to experience emotional reparation from. Resentment comes in and challenges our ability to forgive and move forward. But forgiveness is pricey right? Not many can afford it under our terms but they often test their credit nonetheless.
So if we know that resentment has a way of holding us hostage and bound to other people it’s important to recognize how and when it became a relevant feeling within us and what we can see as contributing factors.
When you feel like you’re not being heard.
Invalidated feelings. This can easily cause resentment because if someone gives us the idea that our feelings are not seen as valid in some form, then we are bound to build up negative emotional reactions towards this person that seemingly has silenced us and took away our ability to be heard. The truth of the matter is we all have a point to get across and when somehow that point is threatened we can build a feeling of resentment.
Unrealistic expectations of other people.
It would be nice to believe that everyone is capable of expending the same amount of energy towards us or towards something as we are. We want people to match our efforts, match our ways of thinking, match the way we love, and match the core decency we carry. It takes some hard lessons and harsh truths to learn that can be an unrealistic expectation to have on some people because some people just don’t have that capacity. Some people will feel burdened by this. Some people will be oblivious to this. And some people will just not be willing to stretch themselves in order to carry this. So the sooner you realize not to hold who you are as a person as the standard for how other people should operate and just let them be who they are. The sooner you can understand how they may no longer fit into the character role you expected them to fit in your story.
Recurring feelings: playing emotions on repeat.
And the most common sign of holding on to resentment is the uncontrollable need to playback experiences and our negative emotions during that moment. We run it back over and over trying to understand, sometimes even to try to justify what unfortunately we may never truly understand. So if we can grasp on to the concept that we can’t hold ourselves responsible for understanding why a person made certain decisions in regards to us and just accept things as is, I feel like we can better understand how to cope with it and then learn to release it, and to not be bound and gagged by it any longer.
The restraints placed on us by the resentment we foster is something that can easily be misrepresented as a problem that we are unable to be separated from without hearing certain words and seeing certain actions from people in order to move on. That is far from the truth. And realistically, some circumstances won’t grant us that kind of freedom. You sometimes have to put in the self work in order to build your mindset up big enough to realize that you are your own freedom and that you don’t have to rely on someone else to give it to you. You have the power to repair the resentment in such a way that builds trust with yourself. Trust that you are capable of getting yourself through some of the tougher moments even if you don’t have all parties on board. The restoration comes with what you choose to acknowledge and fix and given certain circumstances you may be left with only what’s going on inside of yourself to repair. Other people have to do the same for themselves and it’s not your job to make someone else be ready to do this.
Self Reflection Question:
Does the emotion that I have allowed my resentment to control need to be freed? How can I help myself to understand that I can choose to release it myself, for the betterment of my life?
Attitude Adjustments
Attitude enters the chat.
As if there isn’t already enough negativity embedded in the situation, we allow our attitudes to come in and just knock everything over. Attitude comes in because ego or resentment may have left a side window open and it seeped it’s way in and has given us access to this feeling that can self justify to make us believe it’s necessary in that moment.
Attitude can come in and cause even more havoc by bringing in and merging with the likes of stubbornness and entitlement. Attitude mingles with misery and we know what they say about misery…
Don’t invite her in.
While we are entitled to feel certain feelings let’s not confuse that pass with belief that having a strong and negative attitude to make your point is the best way when all else fails. You may have tried a lot of different approaches to things and people. You may given people an ample opportunity to do the right thing, you may have made a strong and undeniable argument from your perspective,or you may have even pleaded. The fact is that when things don’t go the way we anticipate or desire them to go, we are very likely to begin to operate with an attitude in combination to everything else going on if we feel stuck somehow, but believe me when I say this will only muddy the waters.
This will make things harder to see with the necessary scope. Attitude will somehow take control of the situation with the intention of “getting its way” or making a point.
“Attitude carpe diem”
Try not to fall for the hype and the adrenaline, attitude is not really on your side. And in that moment it’s doing everything it can to seize the day. Attitude wants you in a place of what you think is control because of the justified anger but really that’s just a ploy to self sabotage and steal your joy. And how crazy it to think that you have somehow become the key accomplice to that major heist?? Checking your attitude at the door of any situation is going to be necessary for the most effective way to communicate how you truly feel. This is going to require patience within yourself, towards others and towards the circumstances.
Self Reflection Question: How does your attitude affect how you make decisions and how you communicate those decisions to others?
The ending of an E.R.A
It comes down to this…
The ending of ego, resentment and attitude as an era in our lives should motivate us. It should motivate us to challenge ourselves in very sensitive pressure points that could very easily be misconstrued and mishandled. It should motivate us to take on a better and healthier way to manage life stressors.
Reversing what we so easily activate in tough circumstances might be hard to do and it won’t always be our go to plan when emotions are heightened. In fact, it’s very likely that we will use one of these to somehow justify our decisions and actions while not necessarily being in the best position to do this. In other words…the position of being so very wrong.
But ending this era is what some of us are just steps away from being able to do successfully by way of using critical thinking skills, self awareness and reflection. We hopefully are growing and learning and developing an actual capability to see things from a bigger more productive perspective. A more powerful and self serving perspective. But self serving in a way that ultimately manifests peace and calm in our lives not in a selfish self absorbed way. A perspective that teaches us to show up fully prepared to communicate effectively and to understand that our feelings are still valid regardless of what any opposition might suggest, but that when we end this “era” we are making a conscious effort to remove things that we are clearly contributing to a situation that hinders it from positive growth.
We eliminate the ego, repair the resentment, and adjust our attitudes.
Until next time my lovelies.
Peace & Blessings
La’Ray Renee
You can find part 1 & 2 of this series below:
Going Into Her Solo Season PT 1
The Signs You May Need To Go Into a Season of Solitude PT 2
Check out the podcast entry below.
You can also stream this entry on any podcast platform including Spotify Apple Podcasts, and an audio only version is available on YT.
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