Never Too Late for a Happy Childhood
In 2005, I heard Wynonna Judd make a most surprising statement about healing painful memories. It was at a full day event with big name speakers like Loretta LaRoche and Joan Borysenko. Wynonna was the requisite, pop-culture celebrity name the organizers added to their roster and I didn’t know if her talk would really be up to the same standard as the rest. All five speakers that day were fabulous, but the one thing that’s stuck with me most vividly, five years later is Wynonna Judd’s bold, albeit illogical, assertion about happy childhoods.
“It’s never too late for a happy childhood,” she said.
“Never…?” I thought. “I’m an adult… how…?” Immediately, it was a statement I wanted dearly to believe. It was also a statement I found impossible to accept as remotely plausible.
The idea was just too compelling for me to dismiss. Five years ago, I still felt the heavy weight of wrenching memories, too numerous to count. Always hell-bent on personal growth, I never doubted that I’d be able to look back someday without stabs of pain. Wynonna’s statement made me really stop and think about achieving more than the mere absence of pain, but to actually possess a storehouse of happy thoughts in the form of joyful memories.
I imagined what it might mean to have a happy childhood. Perhaps I’d be able to relate better to other people’s nostalgia, or smile as I reminisced on my own life. Or maybe I’d just feel more complete, like I never missed out on anything.
She spoke of her own healing process without directly defending the remark. The way she left it with the audience, it felt like an open challenge for each of us to find our own truth in what she’d said. And I most definitely wanted to.
Her words continue to come to mind today, cropping up whenever I need to confront any part of me that still opposes their veracity. Wynonna never said you could have a happy childhood over night, and just figuring out how to create one has taken me five years and counting. Do I have a happy childhood yet? Not quite, but looking back it’s much, much happier than it use to be and I no longer resist the changes I need to make in order for my past to feel even better. So there’s been significant progress.
I’d like to share a few of the thoughts and perspectives I came to adopt over the years as I challenged myself to do more than let go of the past, but to actually create a genuinely happy one. Some are a little esoteric, some are straight forward, all of them have been crucial to my healing process.
Idea #1: The past isn’t real. Seriously, it’s not. It used to be, but not anymore. The only thing that is real, and true, is the Here and Now. How could it be any other way? It really is just a simple fact that what we call the “past” and “future” physically are nothing more than mere notions in our head.
Idea #2: Because a past experience no longer exists, our past can’t possibly be how we experienced it at the time. The past is how we remember it today, because that’s all that remains.
Idea #3: There is no dishonesty in re-writing your own memories. Of course, trying to re-write other people’s history or impose our version of the past on others (the way holocaust deniers do, for example) can be harmful, and we’ve no right to do that. But re-writing our own past is fair game. There’s no objective truth in our memories anyway!
Idea #4: Those Buddhist monks are right. Reality is subjective. “Truth” is entirely dependant upon the perceptions of the observer. So it only makes sense to accept something as true if it serves us in some way. If it doesn’t serve us to believe that it’s true, presume it to be false. If the way we perceive our past doesn’t serve us, why accept it as inalterable? Indeed, why accept it as truth at all?
Idea #5: Reflecting upon past hurts certainly reveals lessons at times, but that’s no reason to hang onto them! (This was a really tough one for me to accept). I was afraid that if I let go of my pain, I’d lose sight of what I’ve lived through. The opposite is true. Only by trying to let go of the pain for good have I discovered the full extent of the damage done, and seen a larger picture.
Ideal #6: It feels really good to hug your younger-self. If you haven’t done it before, try it right now! Think back to when you were hurt, alone, or perhaps unsupported. Imagine your past self vividly, and then imagine giving that younger-you a hug. It feels fantastic! You might even imagine yourself saying something younger-you really needed to hear. Notice how good that feels. This is truth! Anything that genuinely feels good clearly serves us. Make it your truth.
Idea #7: Each time you remember a past hurt and imagine an alternate (happier) ending for that scenario, you are subtly changing the feelings associated with those memories, and thus changing which emotions the memories evoke. (You’re not going to become dellusional or lose sight of the events that unfolded. You’ll just feel healthier as you think them over.)
Idea #8: Find a nice, hard covered journal that’s sturdy enough to last a long time. Start making a list inside it of happy memories. This simple task turned out to be far more powerful than I’d ever imagined. Memories on the list can include small, ordinary moments as well as big dramatic ones, just so long as the memories each hold some joy for you without any dark undertones. You don’t need to go into huge detail, just a sentence or short paragraph on each that’ll jog your memory. It took me months to come up with the first five because I was so depressed at the time. After that they came more easily. Not only is it therapeutic to keep the list, it can lead to some profound realizations. Try it and see for yourself.
Themocracy
Great article Tara! Your wisdom really helps me to forgive my past. I know I’m healing my past by doing all the things you suggest. Thank-you.
PS – I think you could turn these 8 ideas into a book.
Wow, thanks Christine!!
I’ve already got a massive project to finish before my baby arrives, but a book is definitely in my future plans.
Current project? oh nevermind, I’ll just make that a new blog post…
btw, I’ve been getting a TONNE of generic comments lately and I’m not 100% sure it’s all spam. Please be aware that if your comment is so generic you could’ve left the exact same text on anyone’s blog, I’ll have to mark it as spam and delete it. Thanks!