I was recently pondering life, the universe, and everything, as I often do. I came upon a query that I have yet to satisfactorily answer in my mind. Okay, it’s like this. There are literally tons of different perspectives and ideas surrounding what make us the people that we are. In “my” opinion, we are the result of emotion, experience, and energy interacting together and upon one another. Admittedly, I am not the same person I was a year ago. But, wait…..yes I am, I am still the same person according to my driver’s license. I still remember all the same childhood memories. So what is it that changed? Hum….tough to say really. Seems to me my perspective of myself and the world around me has shifted a bit in another direction from the point it was at a year ago today.
Sound good so far? Well here is the kicker. I caught myself indulging in some older mentalities that for the most part are detrimental to my emotional health (a bit of personal hazing for something I felt a need to cut myself to shreds over – who can even remember now). It was at this point when I started to wonder, just how do I re-write those behaviors and thought processes within myself? I mean, look here, it took me my whole life to develop into the person I am today. And, I am constantly hearing, you have to love yourself. Yet, these things are not very desirable character traits if you ask me. How does one step outside of the stream? The stream of life experiences that breathed life into a full range of emotions fed by the energies chosen to pump into them. Do I cease to be me if I discard my past? Isn’t experience beneficial? How do I utilize the past and keep it from tainting the here and now without loosing its usefulness?
Since we are essentially a culmination of feelings bound to life experiences that we catalog diligently in or memories, what do we become when we discard the past? I can think of no other way to really get some of these old uncomely mental processes out of my persona. Kind of like dumping your hard drive and reformatting the disc, if that makes any sense. Would that even work? Why can’t we just identify the problem, and uninstall the program? Geez think about how much easier that would be.
Truth is I guess the only real answer to this is perseverance. Knowing what you want to change and reminding yourself of it every minute of everyday until it becomes ingrained in who we are. Hum….kind of sounds like brainwashing huh? Don’t kid yourself, that’s exactly what it is, a form of personal brainwashing. Most of you are probably thinking, damn, that’s a bit harsh. Not really. Every single one of us willingly participates in brainwashing every single day. Think it over now before you start railing on about how far out in left field I am. How many times a day do you see, what society in general has deemed to be beautiful, moral, revered, normal, etc? The list of things defined through constant repetition in our everyday lives is staggering. To me that seems an awful lot like brainwashing. (Shrugs!) However, I have no problem whatsoever using the same methods in order to affect changes for the better within myself. I’ll let you know how it goes.
