Imagine three surgeons. Each makes a similar, health-changing mistake with a patient.
Years later, they meet. One, shamed, suffers depression. "I still have nightmares about that case."
The second, choosing craven indifference, says, "Not me. I stopped caring about that."
The third picks the cowardly weapon of blame, "It was a nurse's fault."
Each could learn from the inimitable David Whyte: "Memory is not just a then, recalled in a now, the past is never just the past..." It is, "...a then continually becoming other thens, all the while creating a continual but almost untouchable now."
Shame, indifference & blaming are Ego's options. A veteran physician friend shared a different approach. "I inserted a needle an inch away from the right spot & caused suffering. I told the patient, took responsibility & will probably get sued. I regret my mistakes & learn form them. I love my patients and I'm a good doctor."
By applying a mature label, my friend created a then that makes him an even better doctor now.
Mislabeling thens sends millions (including me) for psychological help.
As a dedicated film artist, I study images every day. Fine photography is an art but its apparent reality also makes it one of Memory's messengers of feeling.
Artists name their pictures. Occasionally, I rename some of mine. How many of your mind's uglier portraits & events would be detoxified by renaming?
It is a giant mistake to think of memories as fixed facts. Two things that change memory are new information & new thinking.
Forgiveness is a remarkable way to dilute poisonous thinking, not only for yourself but for anyone else you have demonized as someone who "ruined" your life.
How many other ways can we interpret thens that would add quality to our remaining nows? Starting with this one?
-Erie Chapman
Photoart by Erie "Emerald Memories" (2022)
