The High Cost of Holding Grudges
The High Cost of Holding Grudges

Inner Bonding

Dr Margaret Paul explains why grudges feel protective yet quietly harm emotional, spiritual, and physical wellbeing. She outlines how Inner Bonding can help release resentment, tend to deeper grief, and move towards genuine self-love and forgiveness.

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18:59•8 Sept 2026

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The High Cost of Holding Grudges with Dr Margaret Paul

Episode Overview

Grudges come from the ego-wounded self’s need to control pain and outcomes, but actually deepen suffering and block joy.
Resentment harms the person holding it, closing the heart, activating the nervous system, and keeping life stuck in the past.
Underneath grudges are often unprocessed feelings like heartbreak, grief, loneliness, and helplessness that need compassion, not blame.
Inner Bonding helps shift from controlling others to taking loving responsibility for your own feelings and actions.
True forgiveness means releasing resentment for your own sake, without condoning hurtful behaviour or staying in unhealthy relationships.

“Resentment is like taking poison and then expecting the other person to die.”

How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety and emotional freedom? This Inner Bonding episode with Dr Margaret Paul zooms in on a surprisingly common trap: holding grudges and calling it self-protection. Speaking directly to anyone who feels stuck in resentment, she unpacks why grudges feel so tempting to keep. The "ego-wounded self" wants control – over pain, people, and outcomes – and believes that staying guarded and blaming others will keep you safe.

Instead, as Dr Margaret explains, it closes your heart, keeps your nervous system on high alert, and quietly drains your joy. You’ll hear a striking example from actress Susan Saint James, whose words after losing her son in a plane crash anchor the whole conversation: resentment is like poisoning yourself and expecting someone else to suffer.

Dr Margaret contrasts this with what she calls being "off the mark" – those ego-driven thoughts that create anger, anxiety, depression and grudges, rather than truth, love, peace, and joy. The episode gently walks through how grudges often sit on top of deeper feelings like grief, heartbreak, loneliness and helplessness.

Instead of staying stuck in blame, Dr Margaret introduces the Inner Bonding process: turning towards your "inner child" with compassion, opening to a loving inner adult, and asking your higher guidance what you actually need to feel safe and loved. Practical suggestions include setting boundaries, speaking truth without blame, limiting contact where needed, and choosing actions that restore your sense of personal power.

Forgiveness is framed not as saying what happened was okay, but as releasing the grip resentment has on you. If you’re tired of replaying old hurts and want to free up energy for real healing and sobriety, this episode gives you a clear way to start asking: is this grudge protecting me, or is it costing me my peace?

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