Six Things To Practice During 2014: 1 ~ Make Peace With Your Past~

Have you made peace with your past?

Before you answer that, take a moment and ask yourself the following questions:

Do you feel grounded each and every day?  Are you consciously aware of the present?
Are you genuinely at peace here in this moment?  Are you content with your life?  
Are you content with who you are? 

Do you rarely think of the past?   And when you do, can you honestly look back on past events and situations and have a better understanding of what took place and why?  Can you think about people whom you lost, be it through a physical death or them leaving you to be with someone else, and know it wasn't anything you did/didn't say or do/didn't do?   Can you think about these people without getting upset or going into a fit of rage?  Can look at your past and feel nothing but satisfaction and gratitude?

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If you can answer yes to most of the above questions,  you're well on your way to being 100% at peace with your past!  
    
Sadly, many people can't answer yes to even one of those questions.  Not even one!    And reason being is they spend a great deal of their time dwelling on the past.  They linger in all the memories of times gone by.   Reliving the pain and anguish of the hurtful things said and done to them.   Or reliving all the wonderful memories they shared with a loved who passed on.   

Whether or not the memories are painful or pleasant, if you find you are spending more than half your days dwelling in the past, then you are not living fully in the here and now. 

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So why do we dwell on our past so much?  Why do we  go there to linger in all the memories of what was?  

I've come to the conclusion that we go back  rehashing and reliving our past in the hopes that some way, some how, we can change the past, make it better, right the wrongs, soothe the pain and so on.    Maybe.  But the sad truth is so many  people literally live out their lives, living and re-living it all  in the hopes they can somehow change it and make it better.  Or just make it go away entirely.     Which by the way...never happens!

And then there are those who just refuse to even deal with the past on any level.  They just stuff it all  down deep in their gut or way back in the recesses of their minds.  Living out their lives filled with anger and/or perpetual denial.  Explains all the fucked up relationships don't it?

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So I have to ask, when you look back on your life, what events do you recall having a tremendous impact on how your future was shaped?   What people and/or events still give you a negative emotional tug?

Perhaps it's an ex-lover,  unresolved issues with family or you are dealing with some type of regret for past actions. Whatever it is, it's time to get it cleared out and cleaned up! 

Clearing & Cleaning The Path For A Better Now

Clearing out and Cleaning up your past isn’t about forgetting.  It's about healing.  It's about acceptance.   Through accepting the past for what it is, you come into an understanding that what was doesn’t need to be a part of your present.  Or future!   Once this understanding sets in and takes hold, a wondrous healing takes over.  

To reconcile the past  you will be confronting all those areas that you resist the most.  Keeping in mind of course, Resistance is Futile!

 

Facing the past is the key to releasing it. 

Now to clarify things, I will impress upon you to remember that there is a vast difference between facing the past and just talking about the past.

While both exercises involving going back in time.  Facing the past puts you in a position of power as the observer.  Whereas, talking about the past makes you the participant.

Think about that for a few minutes.   Let it sink in.  

If your happiness isn't the reason to let go of your past, think about your family, your spouse, partner, boyfriend, girlfriend, children and friends. How have the events from your past impacted them? How you behave and act is what your kids will grow up emulating. By continuing to hold onto the past, not only are you destroying your own life, you are crushing the lives of all of those around you. If you choose to go down a path that is stuck in how your life used to be, the people around you will go down that path too.

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Here's an exercise to help you zero in on how the past is impacting your life.

• Write down a list of every person you feel you've wronged.

• Write down a list of every person you own an apology to.

• Make a list of everyone you feel has wronged you.

• Write down a list of every person you feel you deserve an apology from.

If you want to be free from you past, let all of the people you named in the above exercise know how you feel. More times than not, you may be surprised that they have no idea what you're talking about. What made an indelible impression on you, turned out to be meaningless or of little concern to that other person. They simply had no clue you've been holding on to all of that negative emotion which ultimately weighed you down with self-created images of something that may or may not have happened.

Think of all the wonderful things you are missing out on this present by exerting all that focus on all the yesterdays.

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As with all addictions, healing your addiction to the past will take time and conscious effort.  


Embrace All that You are!   
For You ARE All  that There Is!


Namaste!

Next Blog:  

What Other People Think About Me Is None Of My Business!


Resources:  

Terry Ferry

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-ferry/self-help-are-you-addicte_b_631620.html

Six Things To Practice During 2014: Addictions To The Past

We  are living in an age of re-educating ourselves.  Which is  the main reason I began this Blog.   With knowledge comes understanding, and with understanding comes healing. 

Over the next 6 weeks I will be covering Six Things To Practice During 2014.  But before going into all that, I believe it important that we come into an understanding as to why we dwell on the past.  And too, how it effects the brain and subsequently creates an addiction that leads to other outside addictive behaviors.     

Dwelling on the past is, for many, an addiction.     But unlike the other types of addictions we know about, such as drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling and so on,  our addiction to the past is still pretty much seen as a harmful past-time.  After doing some research on the matter, it is clear that Medical Science is working diligently to connect emotional dis-ease with outside physical ailments.  

Following is just a few examples.  And as with anything you find on this Blog, I ask that you take what rings true for you, and simply leave the rest!

Namaste!

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My mother spent over 90% of her life dwelling on the past.   Nearly every conversation with her would be about something that happened to her years prior.  Most of the events took place long before I was even born.  And many of the people she spoke of were complete strangers to me.  But that didn't stop her from recounting specifics of situations that took place 40, 50 and 60 years ago, giving you the time, date and weather conditions!  A  I shit you not!     

Interestingly enough, whenever anyone asked my mother what she did the day before, her mind would go blank!    

Even though she could recall certain current situations, my mother would always (and I mean always) find a way to integrate past events into it!  It was if she was stuck on this damn never ending loop.  No matter how hard you would try to keep her focused on the present, she would just go right back to something that happened to her in the past.   Granted, some of the things that happened were pretty traumatic.  But she had happy times too.  Sadly, she chose to focus more on the bad than the good.   And sadder still, not only did her habitual trips to the past make her unbearable to be around, it also forced her into several psychotic break downs.  It was heartbreaking to know that her unwillingness to fully live in the present prevented her from enjoying life.   

  

Unfortunately, my mother’s nasty little habit of dwelling on the past is not some isolated anomaly.    For a vast number of people, dwelling on the past is a life-time commitment. 

Some who have studied the human condition have concluded that dwelling on the past could be signs of addiction.     

The chemicals triggered in your brain, like any substance abuse, when used for the wrong purpose and over-used, the effects can be, and are, devastating and debilitating.  In many cases, it can also create physical ailments like heart disease, and ultimately…death.

The following are a few examples of such addictions:

Emotional addiction:  needing sympathy and/or attention.  A need to feel alive.  Fear of being hurt or fear of constant danger.  And in more extreme cases, addiction to pain. 

  

Chemicals in the brain that are triggered:  Adrenaline and cortisol.   Reliving certain situations increases adrenaline.  (And yes, there are adrenaline junkies!)    Cortisol governs fear; its primary purpose is to help us avoid hurtful situations and danger.   

Emotional addiction:   can also mean the need to recapture those feelings of security, confidence, comfort and love.  

Chemicals in the brain that are triggered:  Endorphins, dopamine, Serotonin, Oxytocin

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Six Signs You Suffer from an Addiction to the Past
1. You Constantly Talk About the Past and the Way Things Used to Be
2. You Resist Change
3. You Continually Fail to Plan for a Better Future
4. You Argue for the Past that Things Used to Be Better
5. You've allowed Relationships to Become Stale, Uninteresting and Without Passion
6. You have physically or mentally peaked

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So why do we dwell on the past so much?  Rehashing over and over in our minds what we could have /should have said and done?   Reliving memories that are, for the most part, painful and emotionally damaging?  

We’ll cover these questions in the next article.

Sources:  

Psychology Today 

Huffington Post Healthy Living

Six Things To Practice During 2014: Introduction

Starting next week, I will go down the list and discuss each one of these in detail.   

This little exercise was inspired by one of my favorite Radio Personalities...Delilah!

Feel free to share this with everyone in your life!  

Here's to a Healthier and more Peaceful year!