by Susan Quilty

Created on: January 13, 2009

Does your past control your life? In some respects, the events of your past shape your present and future. Learning from the past can help prevent repeating mistakes. However, too much time spent dwelling on your past can get in the way of enjoying your life as it happens.

Living in the Past

It is often too easy to let your past control your life. This happens for many reasons. Perhaps you feel your best days are behind you. Perhaps you are overwhelmed by past regrets or haunted by past tragedies. It is often hard for people to remember that the past is over.

The past can feel like a place that you could visit. It may feel so real that is seems as though it still exists, exactly as it was, somewhere in the world. You may logically realize that the past no longer exists, but it may still feel that real in some part of your mind.

When you are letting the past control your life, it can be difficult to remember that the people you knew before have grown and changed. It is easy to imagine them living somewhere on pause, exactly as they were when you once knew them. This adds to the feeling that the past exists as a physical place.

Looping Videos

When living in the past, your mind may replay events that happened long ago. The memories may play out over and over in your dreams, or even when you are awake. It can be as if there is a video, or multiple videos, running over and over in the back of your mind.

The videos of the past may closely replicate what actually happened, but more often they are distorted. Elements may be exaggerated or changed completely. You may continuously change them to try out all the ways you could have handled the situations differently.

If you survived a traumatic event, these video loops may occur because your brain did not process the memory properly when it occured. When experiencing trauma, portions of memory are recorded in splintered fragments. The audio may be separate from the video, there may be sounds, sensations, feelings, or thoughts that have been stored apart from the rest of the main memory. Any of these splintered memories can recur when triggered, but without being in context they are difficult to understand.

Defining Trauma

Many people have a narrow view of traumatic events. Car accidents, death of a loved one, rape, physical abuse, or being kidnapped are some of the events that most people would consider traumatic. However, trauma can occur in more ordinary situations as well. Further, what is traumatic for one person may not be

• 1
• 2
• 3
• Next Page >>