Why do people hold grudges?

to protect themselves from getting hurt again. It’s a natural reflex. Humanity helps us overcome it.

@Judi : so your implication is that people who hold grudges against us do so b/c we have hurt them?
But what about people we don’t even know?

I think it is just the nature if some people to hold a grudge.

@basp : Ok, but why? What do they get out of it? If we look at it from an evolutionary standpoint, where everything has a purpose, what is the purpose of holding a grudge?

I will admit I hold grudges, but not on silly things like someone disagreeing with me on fluther. I know I am extremely emotional so I sometimes take things to heart and read far to deep into situations. I have learned the difference between people who honestly don’t deserve my forgivness and people who just rubbed me the wrong way temporarily.

Umm… for the record, everything doesn’t have a purpose. A lot of things do but not everything.

Tb
I think it is just the way their internal wiring works. The same as those whose nature it is to be shy or to be ambitious.
As for what they get out of it… My observation is that they get a sense of power, albeit,a false power, but real to them anyway.

@Sakata : as far as emotions go, evolutionary biologists would disagree w/ you. Their stance is, every emotion that we are capable of feeling has evolved along with us, and therefore must serve some sort of purpose.

@basp : interesting. Sort of a way to demonstrate control over our own environment?

Tb
Yes, I suppose.
But, I do have to take exception to the statement that every emotion must have a purpose. I don’t think that is necessarily true.
But, hey, I’m not an evolutionary biologist, so what do I know?
(by the way, I would be surprised if an EVOLUTIONARY biologist would come to any different conclusion.)

If somebody proves to me that I can’t trust them, they lose some of my trust. I can’t pretend that they’re perfectly reliable if they’re not.

-Derek

You probably hold a grudge as the evolved and socially acceptable alternative to a KILL. When you have a grudge against someone, isn’t that person “dead” to you?

A grudge is a great way to never forget a lesson you’ve learned painfully.

@Mr_M : Sorry, I gotta disagree. Seems to me holding a grudge is more akin to hate, and it takes energy & emotion to hate, so the person is definitely not dead to you—it takes effort to hold a grudge!

What exactly constitutes a grudge? When does it go from just not trusting or liking a person to a grudge?

I don’t feel that I hold any grudges, but there is at least one person I no longer associate with even though we’d been friends for over 13 years. She took advantage of me and betrayed my trust in a big way. I even worked in the same company with her for 5 years after we parted ways, so we would run into each other every so often. She wanted to pretend that nothing had happened, but I could no longer trust her and therefore did not want to spend much time with her. I would be civil, but did not spend more time with her than was necessary to be polite. I don’t consider it a grudge though. I don’t wish her harm or anything, but I won’t spend time with her anymore and it would take an awful lot (I’m not even sure what, short of saving my life or something) to regain that trust.

tb1570, interesting point. But it doesn’t take too much effort to hold a grudge if that grudge includes keeping that person out of your environment.

Personally, I think if you’re gonna hold a grudge, keep it for life. Otherwise it’s more a “hissy fit”. Some people turn on and off grudges like a light switch.

I’ve held grudges against a small handful of people in my life. I’d love to say that I didn’t hold any, at all, but I do hold one. I’d LOVE to let it go and each year, I’m getting closer, but it’s a biggie! I’m not sure if it’s a grudge, but it’s the one person that I’ll never be able to forgive.

One person, my ex, I spent YEARS hating him, holding a grudge…why? No matter what you think, IMO, holding a grudge does mean that somewhere you are burying feelings or holding some energy inside and it prevents you from really moving forward. It’s a silly waste of time.

What I’ve found to be better is to just not care. The people that I felt that way about, interactions are rare, if ever. If they occur – it’s over…for the nano second of my life it takes to interact, as soon as it’s over, it’s gone. I really just don’t care. I’m not going to spend my time thinking, plotting or caring. To much time wasted on someone that is just not in your life.

@tb1570 – actually, evolutionary biology holds that every trait an animal possesses and passes on are those that are either beneficial or at least not detrimental to survival. So an emotion such as “holding a grudge” might have some benefit to an individual in a population (perhaps by helping it to avoid someone who might harm the individual) or it simply might not make it less likely for that individual to survive and bear offspring.

Grudge:
*stew: bear a grudge; harbor ill feelings
*accept or admit unwillingly
*a resentment strong enough to justify retaliation

A grudge is a personal feeling of enmity or resentment that is felt towards an individual based on a shared experience. So in this way, holding a grudge could be an indication that this person may not be the best for a long term relationship (which could lead into the evolutionary biology issue).

But when you ask about someone holding a grudge against someone they have never met, then you are actually talking about Prejudice:
*influence (somebody’s) opinion in advance
*bias: a partiality that prevents objective consideration of an issue or situation

Prejudice is where someone treats another based on their past experiences, or lack of experiences, with people who they have classified as a group or as having shared characteristics. They let their assumptions rule over their ability to meet someone with an open heart and mind.

Great answers everyone, and thanks for your time & thought. But, I still feel like we’re missing out on the crux of my question. Why do people hold on to, continue to harbour these ill feelings when, apparently, there’s nothing to be gained from it? For example, you & someone else have a disagreement at work. Months later it seems to have passed, but then a new project comes up and this person deliberately stonewalls you b/c of the perceived hurt in the past. Nothing good can come from it, and perhaps the person is even spiting themselves, and their company, but they continue to hold on to these negative feelings. Why?

It’s ego.

A defensive measure when you feel like you have been hurt by someone is to block them out. If you don’t let them in again, they can’t hurt you. Unfortunately, some people can’t get past that ego part.

Firstly, from an evolutionary perspective, an emotion, or any trait, can most definitely be a disadvantage for survival. That is because natural selection is a very slow mechanism for evolution, whether biological or cultural. Environments change, and so what was once an advantage (holding grudges may have been a useful defense mechanism back we killed our enemies with impunity from law) might now be a disadvantage (its not sexy, and sexiness is now more important a factor than personal survival in reproduction), but evolution might not have caught up yet.

But I think that holding a grudge does still carry an advantage. There is, of course, the fact that one must take care when dealing with those who have proved themselves untrustworthy. More importantly, however, the wrong dealt one might very well have cost social status. When one holds a grudge, one is inclined to act vindictively towards the culprit, and thereby regain that lost status. It’s crude, of course, and perhaps a tad outdated. But the tendency to look cool is very much a mainstay of society.

@tb1570, actually, in the scenario you describe, something good CAN come of it from the perspective of the person holding the grudge. Stonewalling can make the “grudged” individual look bad and do bad and get fired (i.e., “destroyed”) which kinda makes me support my original theory, that it is a vicarious “kill”.

And if the person holding the grudge, himself gets “injured” in the process, wasn’t that the risk prehistoric man ALWAYS had when involved in a physical fight to a death?

Most grudges I eventually let go of, but if someone has really embarrassed me or hurt me, I do not forget. I had an ex-boyfriend kick me to the curb in a very disgusting way. He said an array of awful things to me. He wants to be friends with me still, years later, but I keep a grudge to remember that if I stay friends with him, he will only hurt me again.

Forgiving someone that asks for forgiveness is one thing, but forgiving someone who doesn’t think they did anything wrong is another.

Because it’s the only way they can hold on to the person they are holding the grudge against. Or they are holding on to a time when they thought they were right in a situation.

Good article on forgiveness and letting go. Holding grudges can actually lower your resistance to disease and damage your health.

It depends on the situation and who your dealing with. People who intentionally bear malice towards you, how can you not hold a grudge atleast? As long as you’re in the heat, holding grudges is survival.

holding grudges is survival
I think there’s a distinct differnce between deciding how much you can disclose, trust or be open with someone and being resentful.
One is wisdom and the other is like peeing on your own leg. The latter, only poisons the one holding onto the resentment.

Some people hold grudges since this gives them power over their victums and they receive attention from this too.

i have seen some who would rather hold on to a grudge all their life than solve their real problems of anger etc.