Clean Slate?

My last post was my love letter to London and an acknowledgment of the person I have become in recent years. And, while I meant every word I wrote, something was niggling at me as I continued my travels.

Yes, London Town holds many great memories – a few of which were created during this family trip where we introduced the girls to the place we got engaged. But, just as everything that goes up must come down, life is made up of a mix of moments, good and bad – always carrying its own lesson.

It started off innocently enough…with feelings of pleasure as I saw my favorite raspberry and white chocolate cookies at the supermarket. Oh…how I loved them. But then I remembered when I would eat them all those years ago : at home on the kitchen floor as I ravaged through bags of groceries in a single sitting on lonely nights in between days of starvation.

“That person is a ghost of who you were. Let it go,” I said to myself. And I did. But the memory left an imprint – subtle at first but growing more distinct as others came.

Next was a visit to Covent Garden and the Opera House – a smile spread across my face as I remembered a magical evening at the ballet. But then an image of a man who took advantage of a lonely, scared and vulnerable twenty something flickered in my mind.

“I know better now,” I thought. And yet…another mark was left.

These recalls did not tarnish my vacation;  they did not get me down. Not really. And still they dimmed the lights just a little bit.

Did that make me angry at my former self? Disappointed with my mind’s ability to bring back these thoughts?

Not in the slightest.

I simply accepted them as moments of my past and as thoughts I was having. I surprised myself by acknowledging them but not grabbing onto them and letting them consume me. I say surprised because this ability to let thoughts float by without jumping down a rabbit hole of negativity is something I have been working on a lot over the past 4 months through meditation. I practiced this a lot during treatment but I had never seen this technique play out in my daily life.

In the past, I would have either completely shut out the memories, swallowing them whole and shutting down – or spiraled into a continuous loop of darkness.

Not this time.

Some have suggested I only remember the bad memories. I disagree. For better or for worse, I have an excellent memory which allows me to remember pretty much everything. I am at peace with this because I believe all memories have a purpose and that the negative ones stay with us for a reason (a lingering hurt that needs to be addressed, a lesson to be learned, a pattern that needs to emerge and be broken): to help us grow and heal.

You need the bad and the good because they are parts of you, and acknowledging both of them helps unlock a better self, a better life.

After all, you cannot have rainbows without a little sunshine AND rain.