My son once asked me, “Dad, how do you get rid of a Bad memory?”. It was a very thought provoking question.
After some thought I explained to him that we cannot get rid of a bad memory, but we can remember parts of that moment that are missing.
Our minds are inherently biased. We are constantly judging situations, people and ourselves as either good or bad.
Many times what at first appears to be bad, later turns out to be a blessing. And what we believed to be very good, we later become disillusioned and find the bad side of it.
This is also true for our memories. They are biased too. We tend to either idealize the past, or we will despise it. I’m sure most of us can think of a person who is no longer in our lives who we idealize, and others who we despise.
Idealizing people from the past leads to feelings of grief and loss. Despising people from the past results in resentments and triggers.
But let’s assume for a moment that we were not fully aware, fully conscious of all that was happening in that moment, all of “what is”. Our minds selected certain parts of it which we made our biased judgement on that experience.
So back to our question…How to get rid of a bad memory?
Well that is mostly impossible, we can modify or edit the memory using NLP techniques such as playing it backwards and forwards, making it larger or smaller, and playing funny music to the memory as well. But these techniques seem limited to me and don’t achieve the result of higher awareness.
What we can do is RECALL MORE INFORMATION, adding to the memory. Expanding the memory beyond our initial, biased perception.
How do we do that?
Simple…with a question.
We must look for and remember who was doing the opposite at that moment in time.
First define exactly what the opposite is, then ask the question…
Who was doing the opposite at that time?
Remember it!
Our minds record everything, but what we initially perceive is just a very thin slice of information.
Until we focus on finding the opposite at that time, the memory will continue to be a bad memory. Until we raise our awareness to “what is” and see that every moment has both sides, we will continue to be in a state of biased perception, which is unrealistic perception, which leads to confusion, triggers, poor decision making, repeating cycles of aversion and attraction, and ultimately less control over yourself and your life.
To learn more contact Doug Spence for Online Life Coaching Services in Canada.