Imagine a scenario where you as a young, single adult, genuinely want to circle the globe for 6 months because doing so
Do You Marry Yourself to the Past?
by Ryan Biddulph
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A wise man once professed how he rarely thinks about the past because he has no use for it.
Think that one through. How much time do you spend in the past? How often do you call upon pleasant memories? Dwelling on the past may seem to feel good. Or perhaps you feel an urge to stir up old hurts in order to get revenge now. But time is an illusion. The past is a ghost. Marrying yourself to the past is marrying a ghost. You are bound to something that is not there. Does it make sense to join yourself to an illusion.
Training my mind reveals that digging deeper within unearths a non-compromising approach to time. Time IS an illusion even if the ego pines for the past or fears the equally illusory future. I slowly realize daily that all life fears, blogging fears and business fears sitting in my mind resist solely in my clinging to the past.
Forgive yourself of the past. Feel OK about remembering sweet memories. Accept how imagined grievances seem to fuel present day relationships. But do your best mentally to understand that marrying yourself to the past wastes your energy in reality, even if past memories feel pleasant. The present is the only reality. Now exists. Truth is now. As crazy as this may sound, if you slowly read this post and allow the words to burrow into your consciousness, every single point I make is completely true.
The ego may think about the past but if you intentionally imagine memories, you accept how the memories are not real or true, but fantasies. How can fantasies help you now? How can any illusory energy that robs you of the present aid you now?
Forget feeling good about memories. Feel good about the now. Feel good in the present. Note the world around you. Life's greatest joy is in being fully present.
The Problem with the Past
The core problem with the past and joining yourself to the past is that the past pulls you back while humans in the moment sprint forward in freedom. All of my hang ups about business, money, relationships, blogging and life in general are completely anchored to the past. I lose my power to enjoy now by fretting the past. I lose my power to capitalize on the moment by imagining the past.
The past is a heavy anchor that prevents you from living, loving and enjoying now. The past holds you back to an imagined scenario versus being of greatest service to humanity now.
For example, I have held back my writing on and off during my 15 years online even though I can write 20-30 helpful blog posts/guest posts (cumulatively) daily solely because I imagined how writing 30 posts daily in the past yielded roughly 20,000 to 30,000 blog visits daily but no massive income.
Based solely on my deluded clinging to the past, I hold back the 20 to 30 helpful posts I could be writing and publishing daily, RIGHT NOW, for everyone.
Keep tabs on me. I am slowly transitioning into writing 3-5 guest posts daily as I dig deeper into my mind to release the poison of the past. I also write or update and re-publish enough to send out 3-5 posts daily on Blogging From Paradise.
Take a Cue from the Mind Pros
Enlightened beings live in the moment because it is the only reality.
Learn from beings who mastered their minds.
Instead of pining over the past or clinging to sweet memories of an illusion long past, how about enjoying NOW fully?
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Hi Ryan,
Nice to see you here. Great topic my friend. So many people I run into are stuck in that past mentality. I notice that they are never happy. Dwelling on things like that just brings your energy down and it really is unhealthy. It prevents people from going forward.
For me, I cherry pick good memories from the past and whatever was negative (there was a lot of that) I forgive and forget. I need to be in the present most of my time because it is filed with things I love to do like blogging, marketing, exercising and of course clean food, which btw I love making.
Each day to me is a gift. I love living in the moment.
-Donna