“Must I heal the past to enjoy the present?”
The Question:
I’ve read books about the Law of Attraction that recommend letting go of the past and focusing on what I want, what’s going well, and what I’m grateful for — here and now.
But I just read another self-help book that says I need to revisit my past so I can heal it. I tried the exercises in that book, and I felt really bad remembering my painful childhood experiences.
Do I really need to deal with the past in order to be centered, connected, and aligned in the present?
Unlike many animals whose awareness is never far from the present, we humans can easily move our awareness back and forth in time — remembering the past or predicting the future — but only in our minds. Our bodies are always in the present, but our bodies are affected in the present by our mental time traveling.
For example, when you recall a traumatic memory, your body may react in the present, as if the past injury were taking place now. You may feel a rush of adrenalin, a wave of fear, heart racing, muscles tensing, etc.
It works with good memories, too. So when you reminisce about joyful times, your body may relax and generate “love hormones” like oxytocin in the present. Likewise, positive or negative futurizing (looking forward to something, or worrying) has similar effects on the body.
These bodily effects in the present include not only physical effects, but also mental effects. Emotionally charged thoughts tend to generate more of the same: a little worrying leads to a lot of worrying, which takes your awareness even further from the present.
But it’s all happening in the present.
Mindfulness practices can make a huge difference in your experience of the past and future. Such a practice can be as simple as deliberately noticing that your thoughts about the past and future are happening in the present.
With mindfulness, you are consciously having the thoughts. Without it, the thoughts are having you!
As you become mindful of your thoughts about the past, “dealing with the past” takes on a new meaning. Instead of reliving the past and suffering through it again, you can deal with the past by differentiating it from the present.
Example: “As a child I felt bad when my mother constantly criticized me, but she is not here now, and I have new choices now that I didn’t have when I was a child.”
The benefit of confronting the past comes from realizing the extent to which you gave your power away, so you can make a conscious choice to take it back: “Yes, at the time I thought I was powerless; but that was then, and this is now! ... If I knew then what I know now, I’d have made different choices; but it doesn’t matter because I know what I know now, and I’m making better choices now.”
The idea of dealing only with the present is workable in theory, but in practice, when present situations trigger past traumatic memories, you’re dealing with the past whether you want to or not.
So yes, stay focused on the present as much as you can, including your heart’s desires, gratitude, appreciation, etc. But when painful emotions from the past continually invade your present experience, it doesn’t help to deny or ignore them.
Life is trying to lead you back to the part of your power you gave away in the past, so you can reclaim it for the present.
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