The Grudge Report: Reasons to Avoid Drinking Gasoline

I can't remember who said it, but it's true:  "Holding a grudge against someone is liking drinking gasoline and hoping it will make the other person sick."  Holding a grudge doesn't hurt the other person.  It hurts you in at least two ways.

First, let's look at what a grudge is.  A grudge involves anger directed at another person over a very prolonged period of time.  The "prolonged period of time" is what differentiates a grudge from simply being angry at someone. 

Stuff happens, and we get angry, and that's normal.  But we usually move on, and get over it.  With a grudge, it stays with us, often for months and even years.  We don't move on, and we don't get over it.

The first way it hurts you is that holding a grudge limits your ability as a leader to focus on the right things, the important issues and challenges that face you and your organization. 

Think of the last time you were really angry with someone.  Remember how initially the incident dominated your thoughts.  Eventually you got over it, but at first you probably couldn't think about other things without that incident creeping back into your mind.  When this goes on for months or years, its a grudge.

The other way holding a grudge hurts you is that it has an adverse effect on your health.  Holding a grudge consumes a boatload of emotional energy, and over time it can leave you exhausted emotionally.  Because of the intricate relationship between the emotional and the physical, it can adversely affect your physical health.

Just as drinking gasoline literally eats away at your insides, holding a grudge does the same thing emotionally.

And then there's the people you're leading.  Because your leadership abilities are diminished by holding a grudge (focusing on the wrong things, being emotionally and sometimes physically exhausted), your not serving the people you're trying to lead.

Avoid drinking gasoline, avoid holding grudges.  Get over it.  Move on.