We all live our lives one day at a time, we grow up, and we learn how to grow by the experiences we get through throughout our lives. A lot of the time we are able to move past whatever it was we had to face, we were able to look back and say “I lived and I learned”.
But every now and then we hold onto certain moments and phases of our lives, whether or not they served us good or bad, they become this bad habit we can’t break and we soon see ourselves having to face them time and time again.
But why?
For what?
What is it about that time of your life you can’t let go of? Or perhaps that person you can’t let go of and forget? Is it that maybe your life still isn’t as better as you thought it might have been by leaving them behind? Is it because past relationships are familiar and comfortable to you? Maybe you have been abandoned one too many times and sometimes, you feel that you have finally found the “perfect relationship”, and your partner then walks away, you tend to create this deepening fear that you will never find a love this wonderful again. It is beyond easy to fall back into familiar patterns that once felt so easy and normal.
Stress can play a role in why we feel the need to go back into the past. Being that you are overly stressed in another part of your life can cause you to lose that sense of control. Scientist Russell Poldrack says, as a result, your frontal lobe, the brain’s “control centre,” gets overwhelmed, he says you are more likely to do the things you don’t want to do when you’re stressed out.
But to me personally, it all comes down to fear, and how you overcome it.
Former First Lady Elenore Roosevelt said it best when she said: “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you cannot do”. So, what can you do if you are worried about moving forward, going into that new relationship or having that all important operation which could improve your health? Analyze the nature of your fear, is it based on something rational, or is it based on “what if”?
Fear of failure, of something not working out or something getting taken away, they certainly fall under the “what ifs”, don’t let these rule or control your life. There will always be pros and cons to every decision, it is how we weigh them up against the potential benefits and if or how they might change your life for the better. Life is unpredictable so you cannot be certain with every decision you make, and you will never eliminate all the risks, so try not to act like you can. Making big decisions is simply choosing one of the many paths through life’s uncertainty. Giving our thoughts and fears action, gives us confidence and forces us to learn and keeps us moving forward.
Be courageous but mindful at the same time.
Certain moments and time frames of our lives always leave us with a whole bunch of memories, it is up to us whether or not we stay hiding inside of them, or we simply carry some of the good ones along with us.
There is good and bad in every situation. Mistakes and regrets always made from both sides of the party. But they are made to shape and create you as a person, and it is important to remember what you choose to do with them, defines where you end up and who you are to become. Bad habits do die hard but, in the end, it is better to kill them than to let them slowly kill you.
