LJ Idol Season 11, Week 2:Living rent-free in your head
I can hold a grudge pretty well. But I have absolutely NOTHING on my dad. He can tell you what happened 30 years ago which is why he won’t go to a certain place now. Whereas my mom was more of the huge angry outburst and then quickly forgive and forget type.
My problem isn’t the grudge itself. It’s that I never learned healthy mechanisms for dealing with the hurt, pain, and trauma that caused me to have the grudge in the first place.
About 10 years ago or so, the pastor of my parents’ church (still legally mine, but I rarely go and never tithe) caused the single biggest trauma of my life. Even worse emotionally than my mom dying.
The backstory:
I was put in charge of our church nursery. Things hadn’t been updated since the fifties, so I spent the first two weeks (a LOT of volunteer hours) lead testing and safety testing. The old people were furious that I was getting rid of old “perfectly good” (read: exposed springs, lead paint, unsafe gaps…) toys and things. I focused on that before I started trying to bring more kids into the church through outreach and selling the program, or changing the curriculum.
I had a trip planned six weeks after I took over, and the person who was supposed to cover for me flaked. I was in IRELAND, so it isn’t like I could commute back! The person they found at the last minute didn’t wait to talk to me when I came back, just went complained to the pastor that there was no bible teaching going on in the nursery.
He then informed me he’d never agreed to me being in charge, that he’d prefer someone older with children. Never mind that I’d been to two church council meetings as the rep for the nursery and he didn’t say a thing.
Then the older people complaining about me getting rid of “perfectly good” things went to him. They complained that I wasn’t qualified to judge, it had been fine for years. The church is over 60% people over 50, so they try to appease them at every turn, to the detriment to the church.
My dad was the current chair of deacons, so he set up a meeting with another deacon. He informed Dad that for reasons of propriety, he wanted his wife present. That was a disaster. The deacon was a former high school principal, and he and his wife tag teamed me, telling me everything was my fault, that nobody believed me, and of course there had to be a reason for that as there was no smoke without fire, etc… By the time I got home, I was so emotionally upset I was physically ill.
And a deep, deep grudge began to take hold against those involved. I soldiered on, laboring under the delusion that if I kept my head down, didn’t make waves or ask to do anything, my enemies in the church would leave me alone.
That approach didn’t work, either.
Somehow, from eavesdropping on some conversations in the hall that he had no part in and no business listening to, and of course getting only a bit of out of context conversation, the pastor got it into his head that I was who was mentally unstable. He was adamant that I was the problem and called a meeting to discuss me.
I was informed I would have to see a psychologist before I would be allowed to participate in church life again. He firmly believed I was mentally unstable, because unlike all of the other young people who just left, I stayed and demanded to be an actual part of church life, planned things (for which the pastor informed me I was unbearably bossy), and so on, and so on.
I went to the doctor, who informed me I was fine and to get the heck away from the church. My parents were in a bind, one wanted to leave, one wanted to stay. The pastor didn’t believe the doctor’s report and asked permission to discuss me with the doctor. I was on the verge of agreeing, but my family was adamantly against it. Nope, not going to happen.
I told the pastor no, and he told me he would call me to discuss things in a few days. That phone call never came. A decade and change later I am still waiting. I quietly left the church, without telling anyone why or making a fuss.
For many years, I wouldn’t go into the church at all if I could help it. I felt physically ill at the very idea of entering the building.
The whole situation had a horrible effect on me mentally. I cut off all contact with most of the church people, especially people I believed had wronged me, like the pastor and the lady who took over the nursery (the same lady who made the complaint to the pastor instead of talking to me - I later discovered that the pastor took everything she said out of context when relating it to me). I spent hours in my own head, rehashing things, could I have done something differently, should I have brought things up to the church council? Should I have told people what really happened, called out the deacon and his wife, who later realized I was right about the pastor and got the heck out of dodge?
I could not let it rest, that grudge was poisoning me mentally. I didn’t want to find another church, as I didn’t feel I would be able to trust again.
Until one day, one of my intimate friends had enough. She sent me the following, neatly typed on a green index card:
Holding a grudge is letting someone live rent-free in your head.
They don’t pay rent, clean the dishes, take out the trash, or do anything else to make your head-space better by being there.
Do to them what any landlord does to an unruly tenant; KICK THEM OUT! Let go of the grudge.
She told me that she loved me and she was worried that all I was doing was making myself bitter. That my mother’s constant entreaties to go back, smooth things over and make nice for the good of the church and the family would wear me down, and I’d end up back in the same toxic cesspool again.
I had a heart to heart with her, and then with my Dad. And I got myself the hell out of that toxic abusive relationship for good. I have been to a grand total of one Sunday service in the last ten years, a handful of weddings, baby and wedding showers, and the occasional game night if the people I like are hosting.
I kicked the pastor and the toxic church people out of my head. I cleaned house in my brain, let go of that grudge and they and their opinions of me ceased to matter to me. I talked to some of the people who were involved and discovered what I had been told wasn’t what had actually happened. It took a lot on both sides to repair relationships that had been fractured, and not just with me. Mom and the nursery lady had been best friends, and it will forever haunt me that they missed so much time and a short time after they reconciled, my mom died. Grudges poison your head and hurt you and others in so many ways.
And I have never been happier since I made the choice to let go. Never let anyone live rent free in your head, because your head is yours. And all that brainspace and emotional energy is much better spent in something productive. You are the boss of your brain and your emotions.
Talk to people, find out what was really said and by whom, to whom, and when. I promise you; it is worth it not to give a grudge the headspace to form in the first place - it is much harder to get rid of it once it takes root. It begins to warp your thinking and your outlook on the world and will freeload in your head your entire life if you let it.
Now, I am emotionally thriving, and the church is continuing to die. And I am ok with that.