Why are we all so loyal to our pasts, when it is the future we are trying to create?

If you keep your past activated, it plays a heavy part in your present, and you keep projecting it into your future. How many of us are repeating past patterns of money, relationships, suffering, tragedies, broken heartedness, poor health, our past political and religious beliefs, and wondering why we can’t make a brand new start? All of us do it to ourselves. We are all loyal and bound to our own past, and we form that attachment to it by ourselves. It is hard to let the past go. There are some good, pleasant, loving memories there. But, how do they serve you now? If you are trying to rise up above who you were, and become that woman of the world, that Goddess, how can you enjoy her being, when your identity is based on that past, powerless, hesitant, uncertain girl who hasn’t yet mastered herself?

I know, there is a ton of evidence in the past that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that you ARE that girl who is still learning, trying, striving, struggling, falling, being rescued, misunderstood. One unfortunate byproduct of higher education is that we are all trained to look for evidence. There is no evidence of our future self, that hasn’t happened yet, but I have 40+ years of evidence that I am not, that I have failed, that I have needed to be mended and rescued, and the more past is behind me, the more of that evidence piles up. It is no one’s fault but mine, that I keep staring at it, and concluding, “You see, I am the sum total of all that evidence”.

Both science and math, even the law schools train us into sifting and sorting through the evidence, and to draw conclusions based solely on that proof. We all have degrees in staring at piles of data on ourselves, that data that wasn’t working, and making rational and sound conclusions based on that crap. And it really is crap. If we drew a future version of ourselves based on that old crap called evidence, we would be drafting a phony, a girl wearing a false mask of who she is trying to convince the world she is.

Can you feel confident that you are a successful, powerful CEO, simply because you’re wearing that $1000 stiletto and carrying a power bag? Nope, fashion never turned a woman into a powerhouse. The true leaders, tycoons, and magnates, don’t carry accessories to show success, they ARE success. But to be real, you actually have to feel real, convince yourself, then believe in yourself, and how can you do that when there is no evidence of that version of you? The world needs proof, and nothing is real until proven. So where will you find evidence of that woman you are evolving to be? Where is evidence of your Goddess? How do you convince yourself of that?

The Goddess is always present, she is simply in awareness of her being and her connection to herself, her power is in the now, and she is focused on herself. No, she did not erase her past, she knows where she comes from, but she chooses to be aware of her now. The Goddess is simply that self-aware woman who understands that the past pile of evidence does not serve her today. By refusing to dwell on her past, she shifts her awareness to her blank canvas, that woman she would like to be. Her focus is on that.

How many of us meet a new person, and in the first 5 minutes of conversation, we know all their pain, all they disappointments, all their blockages, all their resistance? They are still married to their past, and their identity is nothing but that.

By now you know all my dirt, I write about it here every day- so the same could be said about me. But that is not who I want to be. Even though in my daily life, I make sure to detach myself from that past version of me, I write about her in this forum every day. How well does that serve me? Sometime I have to take long breaks from writing so that I can recalibrate.

So how to truly let go of the past? I practice my energy, and spend time tuning into new energies. But if you don’t enjoy meditation, there are more practical ways. Write a list of all that is holding you back (your place of origin, your religious beliefs, past abuse, all your failures, bad parents, unfortunate circumstances, your race, your attitudes) and think how you are married to each of those beliefs, and how your bond with that belief has programmed you to play out those old beliefs again and again. We study our parents’ marriages and love dramas, and we continue their story. Every day we learn from Facebook what is wrong with us- there is no shortage of solid evidence against us. And rather that refuse to absorb that evidence like a sponge, we agree, evidence is always true, so now we become martyrs, victims, recoverers and heroes of past traumas. I am no longer a victim of PTSD, abuse, cancer or gluten, now I wear the badge of honor of survivor of PTSD, abuse, cancer and gluten. But a survivor of anything still carries the evidence of it in her life story, every day. In essence, to be a survivor, you still are aware of what you survived, and that awareness brings your past forward. Survivor of abuse is just a projection of that past abuse into the present and future. You will always be a survivor of something nasty, and carrying that unwanted baggage with you.

It isn’t easy to shed our old skin, some of us like it, it looks good on us. Some of us cling to our old pains and sorrows because without them, who would we be? Most of us would have no identity whatsoever without our past piles of contaminated evidence.

I once asked a friend whose abusive mother had died: ‘Now that she is gone, will you release that victim of abuse?’ She replied: “Never, I will always be my mother’s daughter, no matter what. I know that my daughters will watch me struggle with that, and that they too will struggle with that abuse for years to come”. That is a declaration of intent to always cling to that old identity.

So, how do we move past from our old selves? It is hard when our entire program is based on decades of old, credible evidence of our faults. One of the ways I do it, is to rewrite my old story. What have I been harping on for decades? My narcissistic parents whose house I moved out of at 14, and my narcissistic mother who now expects me to coddle her in her old age. Recently, I had no choice but to rewrite my story, when as she predicted, she ended up crippled, incapable of taking care of herself, and demanding my eternal devotion to her. I panicked, I certainly would not devote myself to my abuser, so I sat down and rewrote my story. I only rewrote those parts that I could convince myself of, not the entire story that I could not truly believe. In my new story, I have a more objective, detached, relationship with her. It is true, her cognitive abilities have declined so much, that she doesn’t even remember who she was a couple of months ago. Rather than fight her decline I accept it, because in her new childlike state, she is more passive, appreciative of any help that she gets, and it is easier for me to treat her with humanity and kindness, than that old woman I used to be in combat with. I made up a new story, and I am sticking to it. I am helping a friend who cannot help herself, and I am giving only as much as I can give, and not more. My new story feels much healthier, so I adopted it.

It is hard to not drag the junk behind us, when we are so loyal to our pasts. We keep staring at that old evidence which only reinforces those dysfunctional parts of ourselves. This is why I write a new story every day. By now I have used up 30+ journals, and on days when I have no time to meditate, I write a new me. Some stories are less convincing than others, but I keep writing anyway. When I look back at my journals from 2012, I am astounded how some of my new stories have become reality, and how I have exceeded my expectations in certain areas of my life.

Here is a list of identities that I have successfully shed:  1) the immigrant me that came from a 3^rd world country got replaced by a confident, American me. The evidence of the old me are the tattered red passport, and my slight accent, but I pay no attention to that. I travel with my US passport instead, and use my American name. 2) The wife- how I disliked that identity. I have no problem with marriage, but I did not like myself in that role. For years I carried that with me when I decided, who does she serve now? The broken wife was serving countless toxic men who were looking to benefit from my identity as victim of a bad marriage. Nope, the new powerhouse me, who puts men in their place, benefits me now. 3) The kid who got placed in a foreign boarding school at 11 and felt abandoned and discarded by her parents, and the teenager who moved out of the house at 16 and found a new place to live.  This pile of shit, made me a runner most of my life. I was running from all kinds of relationships, searching for safety, independence, battling anyone who wanted to capture me. But, what am I running from now? Where the fuck am I running to? My new story is of contentment, my new family, being appreciative of the new people in my life, my chosen family.

We all have a past, that doesn’t mean that we have to be so loyal to it. It doesn’t mean that we have to be so firmly committed to what ails us. And it doesn’t mean that we have to keep telling that old story like a broken record. We all have the ability to be more present, and we all have the ability to paint a blank canvas, or fill a blank journal with our new story. We have the right to choose what we focus on, the kind of women we will be inspired by, and when they don’t exist, we have the ability to empower them and convince them that they can, they really, really can.

I have no interest in the person that I was. I am committed to always moving forward, keeping my connections light, helping people along the way, but never dwelling on my old story, and never acknowledging what is keeping my friends stuck. Whatever holds them back, I ignore it, and show them to look in a different direction. How does it matter that some man in the past didn’t give you the life that you wanted? All that matters is that the half of the world’s population is male, and most of them are desperately seeking you. Unfocus from what ails you, focus into what will make you feel good. If you see no evidence of your future endeavors, pick up a pencil and start drawing or write in your journal a new version of you.

Who created God? That’s same force that created the Goddess. She was born from consciousness, awareness, she is our own projection. We are all masters of ourselves, of our own reality, and we dominate our own existence with our own beliefs, thoughts, and by constantly focusing forward. So, write your own story. A true Goddess creates herself into being. What are you conscious of now? What’s next?

S