Making your past a source of productivity and not distress

“If only I had done otherwise, this would not have happened”

We’ve all had the regretful moment. In fact most of us spend more time in our past then we do in the future. However, this may not be a bad thing. In fact, this may be something that the human mind is supposed to do. Remembering your past and reevaluating your past may be a almost like a survival instinct, since we make future decisions by calculating the outcomes of our future decision based on past experiences.

Why our minds find guilty pleasure in constantly thinking about the past

Our mind almost seeks validation from our past. The reason our mind can be fixated on the past is because it is trying to access and fix the negative aspects in order to give itself the satisfaction of and illusion of that negative aspect never happening. When the mind itself senses that it cannot access the past, it is almost left helplessly with no choice but constantly knocking on a door of our past merely pondering and regretting upon it.

The goal

The goal is not to forget your past. The goal is to minimize the amount of energy one spends on their past and make their past a resourceful tool. It is productive to use your past to make more calculated decisions and learning from your past decisions whether they are good or bad. What is not productive is our habit of living in the past, worrying about the future and forgetting the present. There are several ways to make our past an efficient tool in our lives.

Use your past as a dictionary

Think about how much information and practical experiences you have learned in your past. Use your past to retrieve this information when coming across similar situations as you have in your past. One’s past can be a very resourceful library of books filled with lessons, information which can be used to act and make more calculated decisions in the present and future. This isn’t to be confused with letting your past control you. Letting your past control you is different from you controlling how you use your past. Which brings me my next point.

The past is almost imaginary.

By imaginary I do not mean that it is non existent. Yes, at some point, whatever it is that happened in your past (good or bad) did in fact happened, however it has past, it’s value is as good as a mere illusion. Your past cannot be accessed, cannot be changed and most importantly it cannot be sensed. It is no longer tangible. So spending too much time pondering upon something that is a mere illusion in an unproductive manner isn’t worth it.

Count the good aspects of your pasts.

One’s past may have many negative aspects, and it is the negative aspects the human mind likes to focus on the most. However, we should take the time and evaluate the gifts that our past has given us without us asking. When we do this, our mind is not as harsh on itself and tends to take the past more lightly. It is usually the in the context of “victim mentality” that our mind likes to seek our past. In order to beat this, look at what you gained even from the negative experiences and treat is as more of a victory.

It could have been worst.

Think of this hypothetical scenario, you were on your way to a very important meeting in another city and you missed your flight. Few hours after missing it you get the news that the plane had to do an emergency landing in the water (don’t worry, everyone in this hypothetical scenario survived the emergency landing, no need to make the story too depressing). You realize upon this that not only had you not been able to attend the meeting anyways, on top you would have had to experience possible near death situation. We should, no matter how negative our past is (and this is the hard thing to do), be grateful that our past’s negative aspects may have actually saved us from even bigger negatives.

Find a hobby

In order to spend less time living in the past, busy yourself. You will find that it is when your mind is idle is when it goes out of it’s way to seek the past. Learning a new skill or finding something you like doing in your leisure time, is something that can help you.

To bring us back to a point I made earlier, the intangible aspect of our lives known as our “past” is an illusion at this very moment, in the sense that it is inaccessible. Use it this illusion wisely, and do not make it a source of discomfort and stress.

“Chasing your tale? Sometimes we relive past accomplishments, failures and or past relationships to the point of exhaustion. When we do this, I liken it to a dog chasing its tail, just spinning round and round and going nowhere fast. Constantly chasing our own tales has the same effect on us. It leaves us in a state of dizzying immobility. When we wrap our arms so firmly around our past we leave little room to embrace our present future and that, my friends, is a sad tale to tell. ~Jason Versey”
― Jason Versey, A Walk