6 Ways Re-Watching Your Past Can Help You Move On

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Brock and I are currently re-watching all of the released seasons of Game of Thrones.

We were late to the GOT party, only bingeing on the first 5 seasons just last year. But even though the characters and plots should be fresh in our memories, we realized after recently viewing season 6 that we had significant gaps in our comprehension and analysis of the story.

The initial viewing was a journey of emotion, raw and often impulsive. It provided us with feeling (so much feeling!), but left much to be desired in terms of understanding. The second viewing has been illuminating. The emotional response has nowhere near the intensity that it did in the beginning, but from this perspective, we are now able to make connections that eluded us earlier. It all makes sense now. 

After the finale of season one wrapped the other evening, I realized that the process of re-watching Game of Thrones in order to build a complete picture of the story and find understanding of the characters and their motivations was analogous to how I approached processing my own past.

Here are 6 ways that re-watching your past can help you move on:

Re-Watching As an Active Pursuit

If we simply sat inert on the sofa with Game of Thrones playing on the television, we would gain nothing more from the experience. Instead, we are alert as we watch, looking for clues and connections we missed the first time. We utilize the pause button so that we can discuss a theory or a sudden realization. When we’re still confused, we seek help, learning from those who are more experienced. Overall, we benefit from considering other perspectives and opinions as we develop our own.

It’s easy to be passive about your past, allowing mental films to play on repeat. This is ruminating, not processing (learn more about this) and keeps you stuck instead of helping you move on. Instead, be an active participant as you review your marriage and its demise. Focus on making connections and creating understanding. Seek outside viewpoints and guidance, but also realize the importance of adhering to what feels true to you.

Analysis is Easier When All is Revealed

When we first watched Game of Thrones, we had to accept certain actions and decisions by the characters at face value. We didn’t yet understand the history and background that would lead a character towards a certain choice (especially because some of these connections are not revealed until much later). This time through, we’re able to piece together the long-standing conflicts between the families and follow the wrongs that have been committed on all sides. It doesn’t make some of their decisions any more palatable (I had forgotten how gruesome the Stark slaughter is!), but it does provide some insight into their motivations.

When you’re reviewing a marriage after it has ended, you have all of the puzzle pieces you need to create an awareness of the big picture and to propose some plausible motivations for choices and behaviors. If you can find some understanding into why your ex did what they did, it can help soften any residual anger and release any lingering victimhood. Seeing the bigger picture doesn’t excuse poor choices, but it does help to see them a bit differently.

Assumptions Are Often Incorrect

As we watched the first time through, we lost track of many of the details and often took a wrong turn while trying to decipher the tangled branches of the family trees. We made assumptions to fill in the gaps of knowledge and to bridge between story points. We help many of those assumptions through all of the initial viewing. They became our lens for creating understanding. And now many of those conclusions have been challenged and it impacts the way we interpret further information.

The end of a relationship is a fertile breeding ground for assumptions. So much is unknown and so much is felt, that we easily assign erroneous conclusions. Conclusions that then become the basis for any further interpretation. By actively re-watching with an open mind, you can evaluate your early assumptions and decide if they still hold true or if they would benefit from revision.

Nobody is All-Good or All-Bad

I had forgotten how much we hated him in the beginning. One of the characters is a multi-faceted and overall kind man in the latter seasons. But in the first episodes? He comes across as a self-centered and impulsive man. And he was. Until he faced things that forced him to change his ways and broaden his perspective. Throughout the story, we see the weaknesses and strengths of all the characters, even those who are most celebrated or reviled. Some have commendable motivations for horrific acts while others perform valiantly in one venue and are reprehensible in others. Ultimately, there are no “good guys “and “bad guys”. There’s just guys, trying to make it through.

At the end of marriage, especially when your spouse behaved badly, it’s easy to cast them as the “bad guy” and paint yourself as “the good one.” It feels virtuous at first and there’s a comfort to be found in shifting all blame. But eventually, you end up typecast, not as the “good guy,” but as the victim. As you re-watch your past, be alert to signs that your ex had a good side and be aware of your own darker urges and behaviors. Nobody is all-good or all-bad. We’re simply all human.

A Negative Event Can Lead to Positive Outcomes

One of the aspects I love most about Game of Thrones is the strong characters who refuse to be limited by the tragedies that befall them. It’s easy to paint some of these events as negative. And in the short-term, they often are. But then we see the characters learn from the event, challenge their limitations and finally grow stronger than they were initially. As you see a paralyzed child learn to master his mind, it’s no longer clear that the event that caused his injury was detrimental to his life in the long run. And now, watching those early tragedies, there is none of the original sadness, because we see it as a beginning, not as an end.

Our lives aren’t filled with as many plot twists as the series (thank goodness!), but we all expereince events that are easy to qualify as negative because they are unwanted and often injurious in the beginning. Work to slide the “negative” label off the events in your life. Start by striving to see them as neutral, simply what happened. Then, take inspiration from your favorite characters and think about how you can create positive outcomes. How can you make this your beginning?

There Will Always be Some Mysteries

Re-watching has answered many questions. And prompted many more. The writers of Game of Thrones are careful to always withhold some information. They reveal clues rather than announce outright. There is always room for questioning and position-taking. And re-taking. It can be frustrating at times when you just want to know the facts and all you’re getting are hints. Life is no different. There will always be some mysteries, forcing an acceptance of some unknowns and acknowledging the limitations of re-watching.

No matter how many times you revisit your past, there will remain some unanswered questions. There is no benefit to continue to re-watch after you have learned what you can. Work to find an acceptance of the unknowns. You don’t need to know every detail in order to understand the first part of the story and to begin to write the rest.

Just as the events in Game of Thrones unfold in the same way the seond time through, revisiting your past does not change it. That’s not why you re-watch. You view again to see with newly opened eyes, to approach with a less emotional and fearful mind and to gain understanding and acceptance. And once you’ve done that, the past no longer has anything meaningful left to offer and can safely be taken off your mental queue.

After all, there’s always another show:)

How Do You Get Through Your Anniversary After Divorce?

Posted on by stilllearning2b
anniversary

So according to those that monitor traditions, the first wedding anniversary is supposed to be marked with a gift of paper.

So what do you do with the day once the anniversary has been marred by paper? Divorce papers, to be exact.

Those unanniversaries are going to keep coming. So you may as well get good at dealing with them. Here are some suggestions for you implement before the day, on the day and after the day to help make your anniversary a little easier..

Escape Valves

Posted on by stilllearning2b

I couldn’t help it. Giggles burst from my lips like foam spilling out of an over-filled latte.

I had been taking my Yin yoga class seriously up until the point where the instructor, usually calm and serious, mentioned the human nature of moving away from the stretch. I inwardly groaned at the first escape from the discomfort she mentioned – leaning the body over to the right to release some of the tension on the psoas – as I shifted my own weight back to the left to fully face the stretch. But then I had to laugh as she continued to mention two other common ways that practitioners lessen the intensity.

And I was doing both of them.

She described this human tendency to avoid discomfort as seeking an escape valve. A way to reduce the pressure and lower the harshness of an experience.

And it really is universal, isn’t it. We try to avoid pain or even unease on the yoga mat. In relationships.

And even in our own minds.

It makes sense. At a basic level, we are programmed to avoid pain in order to protect the body and stay away from dangerous objects and situations. Pain is an important sensation. It tells us to remove our hand from the hot stove or to stay off a broken ankle so as not to cause further damage. Relational pain sometimes informs us that we are in an unhealthy or even dangerous environment and provides the encouragement to leave. Internal pain flares when we neglect our own innate sense of right and wrong and serves as a wake-up call.

Those pains are intense. And the message they send is a critical one – stop what you’re doing now or you will only make it worse.

But often we confuse pain with discomfort. It makes sense to seek to avoid pain.

Yet it frequently it makes sense to embrace discomfort.

On my yoga mat this morning, my breath hitched as I leaned into the stress, shutting off the escape valves. If asked, I would have replied in that moment that I was in pain.

But I really wasn’t. In fact, as I breathed into the psoas and relaxed the surrounding muscles, the position lost its intensity and I was even interested in exploring the pose further. By facing the discomfort, I was able to reduce the discomfort.

Without the instructor’s prompting, I would never have faced the initial discomfort. Unconsciously avoiding even the merest suggestion of pain. And as a result, I would have unwittingly nurtured that area of tightness, allowing it to grow unrestrained.

It doesn’t feel good to feel uncomfortable. But that’s often exactly where we need to be.

———————-

I see the use of escape valves all the time in people facing the end of a relationship –

They decide that they should be over it by now and push it out of their conscious mind. Yet no matter how much you push it down, it always resurfaces until the lessons are released.

They try not to think about their ex or the end because doing so creates pain. Yet trying to avoid the thoughts only makes the thoughts grow more powerful. If they are addressed as they arise, they fail to grow.

They look to distractions to escape the inevitable pain of the end of a relationship. Yet the distractions only work for a time and the pain is patient.

They downplay the impact of the end on their well-being, pretending that it really doesn’t bother them. Only their acting out in other ways belies their assertion.

——————–

The pain at the end of a relationship is more the discomfort from the yoga mat than the agony of a hand on a hot stove. If you face it and work with it, it will begin to release.

Opening an escape valve feels good in the moment. And sometimes, when the pressure is too great to bear, it may be needed. But if you find that you constantly need escape valves, maybe it makes more sense to repair the basic system.

(Note: There is a very important distinction between ruminating and processing. Ruminating would be like taking the yoga pose just to the edge of the pain and then tensing up, holding the breath and staying in pain. Not fun and also not going to get you anywhere. Processing is more like moving through the pain: understanding, exploring, softening, opening and finally releasing.)

How to End a Marriage

Posted on by stilllearning2b
end a marriage

How to end a marriage…

The end of a relationship is excruciating whether you are initiating the breakup or you are on the receiving end of the news. Those who are in the position of being the one to announce the end face the additional pressures of being secure in their decision and they shoulder the stress of deciding how and when to end it.

This flowchart gives you a guideline for how to end a relationship. Obviously, not all possibilities are included, but it can serve as a framework for your own situation.

how to end a relationshipA – Use Your Words (How to Have the Difficult Conversations)

B – Should You Divorce? 12 Questions to Consider

C – How to Save a Marriage in Ten Steps

Notice what is absent from this chart – ghosting, abandonment, manipulation and withdrawal. Remember you once loved this person. No matter the circumstances, there is no reason to be cruel.

 

The Ex Purge: How to Break Up in the Digital Age

Posted on by stilllearning2b

From the moment I came home to my husband’s cleaned-out office and a typed letter on the kitchen island, I became a certified professional level cyber stalker. I used Google Earth to get a bird’s eye view of the home he was staying in with his other wife. I learned her school and employment history. I discovered where she grew up and I even found her sister’s name. I compulsively read her blog, where I found pictures of her and mentions of my, I mean our, husband. I even had to endure a description of them showering with monkeys on a trip to Uganda shortly before the court date for the divorce. As I read about their seemingly happy travels, I couldn’t help but wish they encountered monkeys throwing poo.

Fifty years ago, if a spouse disappeared, they disappeared. There were no options for information short of hiring a private investigator. But today, we can all be P.I.s with nothing more than a phone. It’s a bit scary when so much information is available so easily.

I was obsessed. Driven. Once I started looking, I couldn’t stop. Each new image or tidbit of information made me feel ill.

But the sad part? The part that kept me going? It also gave me a thrill. Not in a good way, but in an addiction-feeding way. It was like an itch I couldn’t scratch. Chasing the dragon of information into a rabbit’s hole of social media. With each click, I felt worse and yet somehow I expected the next click to make me feel better.

But it never did.

Instead, all it did was drive my addiction for information.

I felt like I needed to know what he was doing and where he was. Part of it was learning to let go of him; for 16 years, I always knew (or at least thought I knew) where he was. It took time to adjust to no longer needing to know about his life. Part of it was driven by the divorce process; evidence of his whereabouts and activities were fed to the lawyers to bolster the case and refute his outrageous claims. And part of it was that I hoping to find some sign that he was not happy. That he regretted his decision. I wanted some sign that he missed me.

And I never did.

I knew that this obsession wasn’t healthy. I could feel the itch growing stronger with each scratch, worrying the wounds open and allowing them to fester. In the weeks leading up to court date, the behavior grew along with my anxiety about the possibility of seeing him again and of the outcome of the court’s decisions. I was consumed and it was eating me alive.

So I decided to fight back. I set a date – March 12, the day after the court appearance – as the last time I would ever look for information on him again. On that morning, still riding high from the relief of the conclusion of the legal process, I checked the wife’s blog one more time. She didn’t mention her husband’s divorce. I wasn’t surprised. I closed the window, cleared the search memory on my computer and packed away all of the papers around my desk that held the results of my searches. It felt a little scary, cutting that last tie. But I felt in control again.

I was done; I would never look again.

And I stuck to it, resisting the urge even when I learned information from a television producer that made it sound as though he had new charges pending. I didn’t dig when Jeff Probst informed me about the felony warrant. And I didn’t even think about talking to Google when I saw him two years ago at a local festival.

It was a complete and total ban. A self-imposed safe-search filter that has no work-around.

Want to institute a similar ban yourself? Here are some suggestions:

Be Firm

This is no time for moderation. Facebook posts are not like food; you can survive without them. This is all or none. Commit to none.

Put It In Writing

Write down your conviction. It helps to make it more real and makes it a little more difficult for your brain to try to justify “just one click.” In the beginning, make sure a written version of your ban is visible. You can even change your wallpaper on your devices to a reminder to stay safely away from that rabbit hole.

Dig Into the Why

Explore, preferably in writing, why you feel the need to view these pictures and read this information. What do you gain from it? How does it make you feel?

Enlist Others

It’s difficult not to turn to your preferred search engine when you hear a tantalizing piece of gossip from somebody about your ex. So, ask them to help you stay clean. Explain what you’re doing (and maybe add a dash of why you’re doing it) and request that they not pass along any information to you.

Watch the Precursors

Be mindful of the times and/or situations that make you more prone to initiating a search. Is it when you’re lonely? Bored? Facing an anniversary? Prepare a change of venue or activity ahead of time that can be implemented during those dangerous times. For example, I knew that I was more inclined to look when I was feeling anxious. So, I would go for a run (sans phone) whenever my nerves were singing.

Understand the Limitations

Social media is a Photoshopped version of real life. You’re seeing what people want you to see; not the reality of the totality of their lives. When you are concluding that your ex is over the moon because of a particularly sappy photo, you’re doing the same thing as a teenage girl comparing herself to an edited supermodel. It’s not real. Don’t spend your days contrasting your real life with a fantasy.

Verbalize Your Urges

When you feel the urge to look, say it out loud. Yes, you’ll feel silly. That’s partly the point. When you verbalize your drive, you are pulling it into your conscious mind where you have more control over what you do with it.

Remove the Triggers

Clear your history. Unfriend as needed. Remove associated reminders from your surroundings. Do everything you can to avoid seeing anything that opens that door.

Plan Alternatives

Sometimes the drive to look becomes so powerful that it demands action. So have an alternative lined up. What will you do when the pull becomes too great to resist?

Use Technology

There are countless apps and programs that deny you access to your social media accounts for a set period of time. These can be useful when you’re feeling particularly vulnerable.

Create a Virtual Hug

Surround yourself with images from your life that make you feel happy and hopeful.

Prepare for Slip-Ups

You may fall off the wagon. That’s okay. Plan ahead to make sure you don’t stay off. If you start looking, set a timer. When it goes off, you’re done. After a cyber-stalking binge, go on a technology diet, restricting your access until you feel at peace again. Have a “sponsor” at the ready, a friend who knows of your plan and is supportive. Reach out when you need to borrow somebody else’s will power.

Like with anything, removing your ex from your digital life becomes easier with time. And as the urges fade, it’s replaced with peace. You no longer what he or she is up to. And you no longer care.

Because you’re too busy creating your life.

Related: What Happens to the Ones Who Leave?

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