Memory plays a central role in our pains, grief, joys and self actualization but they are not simply dependent on the events of our lives, but even more so, in the ways we remember these events. The events of our lives are probably less significant than the form they stay in our memory.
A French writer-politician once said "one day, it will be realized that men are distinguishable from one another as much by the forms their memories take as by their characters. People remember a similar illness, accident, success or surprise in very different ways and the way we remember these events will affect our self-confidence and directions more than the actual event itself."
It is not surprising then that most of our emotions are closely related to our memory. Remorse is a biting memory, guilt is an accusing memory, gratitude is a joyful memory. Such emotions deeply influence the way we integrate past events into our being and perceive the world with our memories. It is our memories that help us to see and understand new impressions and give them a place in our life experiences.
Our first and most spontaneous response to our undesirable memories is to forget them. When something painful has happened, we just want to forget it and act as if it did not happen. We want to forget the pains of the past and live as if they did not really happen.Alas, but that is just impossible. We can forgive but we can't forget because God gives us a brain with all its cognitive abilities and memory.
The cause of sadness in a person's life is an unhealed memory - a hidden resentment, a suppressed guilt, an unconfessed sin and a painful past. Precisely because these bad memories are often deeply embedded in our long term memory, they hurt even more deadly. By cutting off our past, we paralyze our future and by forgetting the evil behind us, we evoke the evil in front of us. Indeed, he who forgets the past is doomed to repeat it.
Spiritual healing does not primarily means to take away our pains but to reveal that our pains are part of a greater pain, that our sorrows are part of a greater sorrow, that our experience is part of the great experience of God and to accept our past hurts as part of God's will and providence. Prayers are marvellous healing opportunity to cast all our cares onto God and to trust Him in everything. But can we do it effectively, moving forward in life in such a way that all our desires, thoughts and actions are constantly guided by Him?
God provides, He understands... these words sustain me so that I can continue to live my life in pride and courage, giving unlimited love and exploring the limitless potential of being in the midst of what I have gone through. I know that I am still constantly falling into self-defeating emotion and behaviour but I am certain that I will rise again, not in my time but in God's time and this reminder helps to ground and guide the present undercurrent of my life now, difficult as it may be.
Reminiscing those good old days when I listened to Barbra Streisand's "Memory", stayed up all night, drinking and talking about how one day I would... blah blah blah. Perhaps now is not a good time to remember unless it is something beautiful for the memory I have now is too painful even for anyone to want to remember but as Streisand goes..."All alone in the moonlight... life was beautiful then, I remember the time I knew what happiness was. Let the memory live again...... I must wait for the sunrise, I must think of a new life and I mustn't give in. When the dawn comes, tonight will be a memory too and a new day will begin."
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