First of all, there are the quite visible parts of the past that we carry with us throughout our lives: scars. I’ve written about scars before. Some are visible to everyone, say the scars on our hands, or arms, or face. Some are not visible to most people, like scars on body parts that are always covered. But the visible scars are all parts of our past that we carry with us all the time. As I wrote about in that earlier post, scars show how we have survived and carried on. These parts of our past are nothing to be ashamed of carrying with us.
Then there are the invisible scars that we all carry around. Think of the emotional or psychological scars that we pick up as we battle through different relationships. These invisible scars are also reminders of the past. They are a big part of who we are. These parts of our past are so enmeshed within us that I don’t know how we could get rid of them if we wanted to. I’m not sure why we would want to get rid of them, even the ones that are a bit painful. It’s part of what makes us who we are.
Then there is the past the builds our future. I am thinking about my wife, and the decades that we have had together. We have built our relationship on our past. We have a history together. I wouldn’t give that past up for anything. The cost for giving that up would be too great. It would cost us now and the future. (The movie The Story of Us shows this in a great way).
I do agree that we shouldn’t dwell on the past, which I have a tendency to do sometimes, but I don’t think that we can leave the past behind us. I don’t know that we should want to drop our past or forget about it. After all, the past is what makes us what we are today.