Don’t Let Yesterday… January 12, 2007
Posted by TimTheFoolMan in anger, Fear, Learning, life, Love, Reflections, Seasons, Success.trackback
…be a prison for today.
All of us have had things in our past that were difficult or painful. For me, there is no shortage of bad memories for me to play back in my mind, over and over. However, at some point, if we keep replaying those events in our mind, they become the TV show we hate to watch, but somehow find it on every channel, all day long.
What haunts you? What memories lurk in the shadows, waiting for you to give them life and breath by revisiting them? What do you have to do to “let go” of them?
My experience is that such things, theoretically locked up in yesterday, can be a prison for today, stealing away my life. Fortunately, I have the power to cast off those bonds and chains. I have to find a way to let go.
A Fool and his Words are Soon Parted 
I write them down. Find my fault. Share this with another human being and God. And then I humbly ask God to help me. It has worked thus far.
For me anyway, this is a huge deal. But interestingly, not because of anything I ever did or even experienced–but because of what others have done.
My biggest pain has been imagining other people doing things they shouldn’t have done. Sucks the life right out of me.
So learning forgiveness has been a big deal for me. And the more I study, the more I think that’s what Jesus was all about. He said, “Look, if I can do it here as I die on the cross, you can too. Here’s how.”
Another great resource for me was “The Power of Now,” by Eckart Tolle. In it he explains how both the past and the future aren’t even real, but exist only in our imaginations.
Good stuff. Great post. Hugely relevant.
Thanks
Much of what causes us ongoing angst can be exorcised by the act of forgiveness (sometime this involves forgiving ourselves). This is, however, much more easily said than achieved.