Living In The Past

Recently, I have been doing a little covert mindfulness study on my unsuspecting friends and acquaintances.  It centers around the notion that living in the past is a favorite past-time of we humans.

But my study has an even more narrow focus.  We are all familiar with our tendency to get into the “woulda’, coulda’, shoulda” mode and wallow around in our pasts wishing we had behaved differently – a singularly unproductive activity to be sure.  But that is not the subject of my recent study.

I have been observing how eagerly most people move from present to past when an error has been made (usually by the one being spoken to) and how a great deal of the present is invested in the past as the parties discuss what went wrong.  I am aware that a certain amount of “post-game analysis” is useful in preventing certain errors from occurring repeatedly.

However, my unscientific, covert study convinces me that when these discussions occur between adults, the goal is not usually edification or avoidance of further errors.  It is something much less noble.  In many, if not most instances, it is an opportunity for the person pointing out the error to:

• Feel superior to the poor, dumb soul who made the error, thus creating an ego boost
• Illicit feelings of guilt and apology from the error-maker
• Create a form of karmic debt whereby the error-maker now must seek, through words or deeds, to regain the favor of the other party, or
• Simply lay blame for the perceived offense for no other purpose than to be sure that the offending party is well aware of the error of his or her ways and doesn’t accomplish the unpardonable act of committing an error that goes without comment or condemnation from a third party.  After all, all sins must be punished and since God must be very busy, we are more than happy to pitch in and help.

Having conducted my little study, I have resolved to avoid such discussions entirely, since they rarely, if ever, result in useful results and always result in spending the present on the past, which in my mind is a greater error than any of the other small errors of the nature we have been discussing.

I intend to avoid these conversations when I am the one who has committed the error and when I am the one who has discovered an error as well.  As I have begun to put this resolution into action, I have noticed an interesting and comical side effect.  People are determined to discuss “your” errors.  They will go to great lengths to initiate a “retribution conversation.”  They become annoyed when you won’t play along but rather just reply “OK” or some other similar term of non-engagement.

So, if you wish to have some fun, try it for yourself.  Simply refuse to invest (or should I say “infest”) your time (which is the same as your life) with these conversations, then calmly and with amusement observe the reactions you receive.