“Don’t build a shrine for people who treat you like shit”.

I wish I could claim this quote. It’s so clever. So poetic. And so spot on. But even more, I wish I possessed the mental fortitude to follow the advice.

My interpretation? It's about holding onto hurt and resentment. Ruminating on memories, moments, words. The echoes of conversations we did or didn't have that haunt and taunt us. And the spiral into an agonising vortex of- "why did they do this?", "what did I do to deserve it?"

Rumination. The exhausting cycle of replaying events over and over in your mind. It's the mental equivalent of a scratched record, stuck in the same groove, playing the same painful notes again and again. Research has found that ruminating can prolong and worsen negative moods and make you more vulnerable to mental health conditions. I'm not talking about the occasional reflection or processing. It's the compulsive, repetitive thinking about past pain that serves no productive purpose.

The mental pattern of holding grudges is intimately linked to this rumination. A study found that the average adult holds seven grudges at once. That's seven different mental loops running in the background, seven different wounds we're preventing from healing, seven different ways we're poisoning our wellbeing.

The shrine we build

When someone hurts us, we often unconsciously build them a shrine in our minds. Not the kind with candles and flowers – it's more insidious than that. We construct elaborate mental monuments made of replayed conversations, imagined confrontations and endless "what if" scenarios. Each time we revisit what happened, we give it our energy, time and peace.

The irony is that the people who hurt us probably aren't thinking about us at all. They're not lying awake at 3am. We don't own real estate in their minds. They've moved on, obnoxiously oblivious, while we're here, tending to a wilting flower bed they don't even know exists.

The real cost

When we hold onto hurt and resentment, we're actively damaging our mental health. People who hold grudges experience higher rates of depression and anxiety. Think about that. The person who wronged you has moved on, but you're developing depression over it.

You become trapped in a pattern where rumination feeds the grudge, and the grudge feeds the rumination. Each replay strengthens the neural pathways associated with that hurt, making it easier to fall back into the same thought patterns. You're literally training your brain to suffer.

It damages your physical being too. When you're caught in a spiral of resentment, your body doesn't know the difference between a real, present threat and a psychological return to the scene of the crime. It responds the same way: by flooding your system with stress hormones.

Living in a chronic state of tension disables your body's repair mechanisms, increasing inflammation and the stress hormone in the body. So when you're mentally rehashing that argument, that betrayal, that hurt, your body's ability to heal itself is being shut down.

The physical toll:

• Cardiovascular strain: Research has found that intense emotions such as anger and stress are associated with heart rate reactions. Over time, this reactivity can increase a person's chance of developing high blood pressure and heart disease.
• Immune system suppression: Holding grudges increases your stress levels, which can cause high blood pressure, lowered immunity and inflammation. Your body becomes more vulnerable to illness because you're too busy fighting old battles to defend against new threats.
• Chronic inflammation: When stress becomes chronic, cortisol (that stress hormone) stops functioning properly. Cortisol is a potent anti-inflammatory, and its failure to function results in an unmodulated inflammatory response. This has been linked to conditions including rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, chronic pain and even cancer.
• Cognitive decline: Adults who’ve held onto anger and hostility over the course of a decade have been found to experience greater cognitive decline than those more apt to forgive.

The spiral

There are still nights when my brain serves up a greatest hits compilation of every slight and betrayal I wish I'd handled differently (is that the Capricorn in me?). I know the person I'm thinking about isn't thinking about me. And that the mental rehearsal serves no purpose. And yet, there I stew.

It starts innocuously. A song on the radio. A phrase someone uses. A random memory that sneaks in uninvited. And suddenly I'm back in that moment of pain, and my brain is shooting off in all directions. What I should have said. What they probably think. How unfair it all was. How angry I still am.

In those moments, it feels impossible to stop. Like it’s a convoluted mathematic equation I need to solve. Like if I don't keep thinking about it, then somehow what they did becomes okay. Like me letting go means letting them win.

But that’s not the case. It doesn't mean they get away with it. You're not releasing them from accountability. It’s not about them at all – it's about you. Forgiveness doesn't condone bad behaviour; you don’t need to continue to give them access to you IRL. Forgiveness is the path to mental and emotional freedom. It’s you, releasing yourself from the cage you've been trapped in.

Small steps forward (that I'm still working hard to take)

I won't insult you by suggesting it's easy, or by offering a simple five-step solution. If letting go were easy, none of us would be struggling with it. But here's what I'm trying:

Catching myself in the act. Sometimes I can recognise when I'm starting to spiral and consciously try to redirect my thoughts. Not suppress them (that doesn't work) but acknowledge them, and then I deliberately try to think about something else. It's hard, but when I'm tempted to dwell on an offence, I remind myself what it’s doing to my body. It's not worth the cortisol.

Recognising it's a process. Letting go isn't a one-time decision. It's something you have to choose again and again, (and again!), especially at 3am when your brain wants to replay everything. Some days you'll do better than others. That's okay.

Feeling the feelings. Research in integrative medicine shows that avoiding negative emotions is detrimental to the immune system. You need to acknowledge the hurt, anger and pain – and feel it fully. But then, and this is the crucial part, you have to let it move through you instead of giving it permanent residence.

The choice

Ultimately, holding onto hurt is a choice. A difficult, complicated choice that doesn't feel like a choice when you're in the thick of it, but a choice, nonetheless. Every time we replay that conversation or rehearse what we should have said, we're choosing to let that person and that moment continue to hurt us.

The people who've treated us badly don't deserve our ongoing mental energy or the physical toll of our resentment. They don’t deserve our forgiveness in some cosmic justice sense. They might never even apologise. They might never even realise what they did. But you deserve peace.

Treat your mind like you would your home – as a safe, sacred space you that you spring clean, whose threshold you protect. We bolt the door against intruders, yet we constantly leave our minds unguarded, letting ghosts set up camp. We deserve better. So go and reclaim the mental space they're occupying, rent-free, in your head.