Does The Past Really Matter?

As I live deeper into this new reality I’ve lovingly crafted for myself, I’ve noticed a curious, slow-but-steady, unconscious shift unfolding in how I relate to the past.

…

I don’t.

At all.

At this point, recalling the past is like looking at someone else’s baby photos.

Cute, funny, sometimes sad. Memories that look familiar, but aren’t mine.

…

I have a sharp and reliable memory, but I’ve watched once-solid events fade.

I don’t resonate with what I once lived, such as hockey and bodybuilding.

Having history with someone isn’t strong relational connective tissue for me anymore. Not because of them, but because I don’t identify with who I was.

When I look back over the years, everything prior to last May/June feels like a different lifetime, a version of me I no longer recognize, a self that doesn’t exist.

This is the same effect that’s causing me to answer with “one to two” when someone asks how old I am these days, rather than what’s on my driver’s license. My biological age and my spiritual age have never felt so disconnected… and I fucking love it.

But this shift has also been confusing to feel, disorientating to navigate.

So much of how we understand and relate to ourselves comes from what we’ve done. The connections we’ve had. The places we’ve been. The roles we’ve filled.

The masks we’ve put on… 

And worn for so long we forgot they’re there.

I started digging in, asking why this shift has been unfurling.

The answer I’ve arrived at is that this change is a side effect of having felt and released a lifetime of stored emotional experiences that I hadn’t properly processed.

Which, I’ve discovered, holds water in neuroscience, psychology, and Buddhism.

An unprocessed emotional experience activates your nervous system. A loop is opened, keeping that experience relevant, even if quietly, until the loop is closed. 

So left untended, those unprocessed emotions I carried around like precious stones and the experiences they stemmed from, were like little hooks, digging into my skin.

The unwanted move. The hockey team rejections. The house fire. The break up.

All quietly activating my system. All stubbornly keeping me rooted in the past.

Now all that and more has been felt and released… the hooks are gone. I’m not being quietly pulled towards the past while wondering why I can’t move forward anymore.

And somewhere along the way, without realizing, I stopped relating to the past.

I live wholly in the present now, only concerning myself with the future so much as to ensure I’m aligned on my path and oriented towards where I’d like to arrive one day.

With each step forward, the past fades, fades… fades.

Living like this feels strange.

Totally different to what I experienced for most of my life.

But I think…

I think this is how we’re meant to live.

Not from what was, but what is.

From intention, not habit.

With love from the forest,

~ Alexander