MAKING THE CONNECTION

Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is one definition of insanity.

That makes most of the world insane at least half of the time. Maybe you're sick of being insane.

If so... CONSIDER THE POSSIBILITY THAT DOING THE SAME THING OVER AND OVER ACTUALLY MAKES A LOT OF SENSE. Curious?

When you are doing things over and over aren't you basically living in the past, especially when you are expecting a different result by doing the same thing that you have done a million times before?

Telling yourself or other people to live in the present won't help.

Criticism just keeps you spinning because you are up against something that makes sense.

Doing things over and over makes emotional sense...even if it isn't REASONABLE.

Emotional memory is the source of the spinning...We all have it and we all need it...the memory not the spinning.

We need memory in order to function. Nobody has time to learn the multiplication tables or the alphabet over every day. Memory is necessary to find your way home or know your kids. Memory is essential if you are going to live in the present.

However, one of the difficulties with memory is that it can cause one to mix-up what is going on right now with what was going on before. This is especially true with strong feelings that were experience in the past.

This is EMOTIONAL MEMORY.

If you think of a happy experience from your childhood you will probably connect with the feeling of that experience. If you hang-on to it just a minute you can look through that experience the way person looks through a movie into another world. You can feel what you felt and also remember...if you try...the way the world seemed to you then. That is positive emotional memory. If you have it you will feel better all day.

Many people have never really thought about emotional memory. They don't know that feelings from the past are pulling their strings in the present and causing them to repeat parts of their lives and relationships that they would like to leave behind.

When people experience painful emotional memory living in the present can be very difficult...especially if that person is unaware that things he or she is feeling can be set-off by the present and not actually reflect present reality.

Veterans returning from war have painful emotional memories, and psychologists call this POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS.

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