Let it Go

This morning I found myself re-hashing an incident that occurred with a family member over and over again.  You know the kind of thing, something small so you don’t feel you can really go and bring it up with them and have a huge old argument, but nevertheless you find it really annoying and you just wish they wouldn’t do it. To avoid a falling out I said nothing; but in my head I went over the incident over and over again feeling annoyed and upset with every repetition.

While, my sibling had no idea they had upset me and was merrily getting on with their life, I sat in a puddle of anger and hot-headedness. 

Eventually I gave myself a reality check I reminded myself that what happened was over and in the past, that in the wider scheme of things (world hunger, poverty, etc) it was not that important and that anyway by this time next week I’d have ceased to care about it.  

Nevertheless once I’d calmed down I got to thinking about how often we do this to ourselves.  You know what I mean.  All those things, that we really wish we could forget but don’t.  Incidents, arguments, events, embarrassments, it’s like it’s a film on a permanent loop in our head, which we watch repeatedly.  Its past, it’s over, it’s happened, it’s done with; but we’re not done with it.  We keep thinking about it and wallowing in it.   

The problem is it’s not just pictures; we feel every moment of pain, shame, fear or guilt as fresh and as deeply as if it had just happened. It’s like we’re masochists repeatedly lashing ourselves with our own mind-made whip.  

It’s like we can’t stop it, like it is out of our control, but really it’s not.   

Like I did, we have to just stop.   Really, we need to think of something else, go and do something that makes us feel good and puts a smile on our face, try a change of scenery or just try putting whatever it is into a wider perspective. 

Whatever we do we have to stop making ourselves feel bad by constantly re-living the past.  

Forget it; put it behind you, because in the end, the only one who feels the pain, anger or shame of it is you.  So let it go.