Realized something interesting the other day…
We all know that movies can either lift us up emotionally or bring us down based on the story line and the content, right?
“Legally Blonde” (no matter how many times I see it) lifts me up and makes me laugh. Go Elle!
And yet, there are other movies (like “Sleeping With The Enemy” or “Not Without My Daughter“) that I wouldn’t choose to watch again because I didn’t enjoy them the first time around…and I felt disturbed, or scared, after watching them.
Think about the movies you’ve seen that you didn’t like…
Gasp!
Are you running off to Blockbuster each weekend to rent them again?
(Hint: This is the part where you say, No.)
But here’s the thing…
Most of us are doing something very similar to that…
It’s like we’re pulling our WORST home movies or journals off the shelves – the ones we hated and that made us feel scared, anxious, stressed out, and depressed – and we’re watching and reading them over and over.
When we do this, we get into that bad mindset and our whole identity becomes wrapped up in being that version of us who suffered so badly. So we wind up taking action out of that negative, stressed out place and it’s no fun.
Reading our sad, traumatic, life stories over and over is like forcing ourselves to read through a huge book that we hate.
Instead of choosing to re-read or replay stories about our lives that build us up and make us feel inspired and feel good, we wind up pulling these old volumes off the shelf of our minds and getting into the drama of titles like these:
- My Period Leaked On My Jeans In 8th Grade And Everyone Saw
- My Childhood Was So Sad And I Didn’t Have Everything I Needed
- That Crazy Bitch Did Me Wrong And I Hope She Dies
- My Dad Neglected Me And He Wasn’t A Good Role Model
- That Shouldn’t Have Happened…But It Did…And That SUCKS!
I’m sure you’ve got some juicy titles on your Shelf-O-Life-Stories, eh?
So lemme ask you…
If someone actually wanted to be happy…like REALLY had a priority in their life that they felt happy, would it make sense for them to choose to read or watch these types of stories or movies?
Do you think the Dalai Lama is reading things like this?
Are these the kinds of stories Patch Adams would have read to his terminally ill patients?
If your 14 year-old daughter said she was bummed and depressed, would you suggest she read any of those titles to be cheered up?
Survey says: No.
These stories are NOT inspiring. And they don’t contribute to our happiness. Rereading them is actually like choosing to reread our worst nightmares.
And then we wonder why we’re bummed, struggling to get things done, feeling blah, stuffing our faces, and want to stay under the covers.
It’s because we’re replaying the worst moments of our lives over and over and we’re reinforcing the identities and yucky emotions that go along with them.
Now, these kinds of stories do have their place along our healing journey, but let’s be clear…
What we’re looking at here is the reality of how we feel when we focus on them.
Truth: These stories are not empowering. They’re actually disempowering. And we don’t feel happy when we reread these sad stories from our lives. That’s why they’re called sad stories.
Something I Learned When I Was A 3rd Grade Teacher
We were often reminded that for every negative thing we said to a student, it could take 7 or more positive comments to counteract the effect the negative comment had.
When we apply that to ourselves, we’ve been giving ourselves SO many negative comments over the years by replaying these sad and traumatic stories in our minds.
What can you do today to start counteracting the negative input you’ve been receiving? What happy stories from your life can you choose to remember and reflect on (for at least as long as you tend to reflect on the yucky ones?)
Here’s an activity I’m going to do. Wanna do it with me?
- Make a list of 11 happy memories from your life. Maybe it was getting a new bike. Having a surprise party. Winning an award. Getting married. Swimming with dolphins. Whatever it was. Make a list of 11 happy memories from your life.
- For the next 3 days, track how often you find yourself dwelling on one of your old, sad, traumatic life stories. Jot down how many minutes you spend thinking about it. It doesn’t matter which sad story you’re “rereading” – we’re going to be focusing on the amount of *time* you spend with that story.
- Then, on the same day…make sure you spend the same amount of time (if not more) intentionally reflecting on one of the happy stories from your list of 11 happy memories.
I’m serious about this. Use a timer. Give yourself at least as much time to focus on happy stuff as you focus on the bad stuff.
Let me know what happens! I’ll be doing it along with you and posting my findings here too.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
11 Happy Memories I Will Reflect On:
1. Speeding on the waverunner in Cancun.
2. Playing in the rough waves with my mom when there was a storm.
3. Having a bean burrito making bar to celebrate winning awards.
4. Flying out to see my sweetheart Giovanni for the first time.
5. Realizing I’d just run 3.3 miles for the first time.
6. Driving around in my little white Honda Civic Ex w/loud music.
7. Laughing till I cried with my friend Corinne.
8. Running on the pier and seeing seals and dolphins.
9. Riding my maroon 10-speed bike with my friend Anna in the summer.
10. Dancing in Zumba class.
11. Seeing hummingbirds come to my feeder.
Noticing: It took me much longer to create this list of happy memories than it would have taken me to write a list of 11 crappy memories. Shows me just how much my bad stories are “top of mind.” My new choice is that it’s easy to remember happy times.
A little like “find your happy thought Peter” in the movie Hook. Cool idea So here are my 11 things
1. kayaking with dolphins on wellington harbour
2. riding BIG waves at long bay
3. swimming with sotty shearwaters at Waiake
4. swimming near diving gannetts
5. watching the tuis on the apple
6. having my first baby placed on my stomach
7. pitching silage on the farm with my Dad
8. snorkelling with my daughter and hearing her giggle
9. watching the full moon rise as the sun set on the lagoon in tarawa
10. The humming bird coming so close as I said prayers on salt spring island
11. Going into the Shrine of Abdu’l Baha in 1974
Hey this started hard and then I could find lots, often to do with water and birds. Am smiling now thanks Mona
@Margaret – Awesome! You have lots of amazing happy times to remember. You’re good at making yourself smile too. Thanks for sharing! And I’m so glad you’re here on the blog with me.
1. My last feminist book group meeting. Great discussion during the meeting. Lots of laughs at the coffee shop afterwards.
2. My long distance boyfriend’s last visit. Lots of long over-due snuggles.
3. The trip my mom and I took to Daffodil Hill just the two of us the Monday after Easter when I was 11.
4. Learning about similes and metaphors in 4th grade. I wrote my first poem and the teacher liked it so much he let asked me to read it to the class.
5. Gossiping and rehearsing choir songs with my best friend in college.
6. The personal narrative class I took one summer with Ali Liebegott where we went to the zoo three days a week and wrote creative non-fiction observations about the animals.
7. Headlining at T.M.I., the local spoken word series, for the first time.
8. Visiting Portland and getting to see Powell’s Bookstore.
9. Friday nights playing pick-up basketball and coming back to the dorms and playing marathon games of chess my Freshman year in college.
10. Seeing the ocean view for the first time from my 9th story dorm lounge balcony move-in weekend. Someone commented that the view looked like a postcard and that it was amazing that we actually lived there.
11. Learning to salsa dance. The point when halfway through the class series I could do the steps almost unconsciously. Thinking I might actually have some coordination after all.
This was a nice exercise. Thanks for sharing it.