Practice a Shorter Memory
Optimism doesn’t have to take the backseat, but pessimism doesn’t get to drive, either.
This morning did not go as planned.
I woke with the alarm, rose, and scoured for tennis shoes. They were hidden underneath the sweatshirt I normally wear, but had ignored as I didn’t need it on a warmer morning like today. By the time we were finally on the sidewalk, we’d returned to the house and opened the garage no less than five times.
Once for the collar, once for the electronic remote for the collar. Once for a new roll of puppy clean up bags, and again for a quick drink of water before I fell coughing to the sidewalk, unable to breathe through the unhealthy levels of wildfire smoke in our valley. The final time was for a fanny pack, because without the sweatshirt and its handy pouch-style pocket, I was carrying way too much to keep a handle on the leash.
As I walked off the first eight minutes of back-and-forth frustrations, I remembered something my grandmother told me a few days earlier.
“Keep a shorter memory.”
I wanted to ignore such a statement. It felt dismissive in the face of our present circumstances. But over the next few days, I tried to recall her words with an understanding of compassion. She didn’t need me to dismiss the painful moments in a way that left them all but forgotten. She was inviting me to rekindle my fire of hope.
As a kid, I was always glass-half-full and shouting, “You can do this!” to anyone who would listen. I’ve lost track of the consecutive annual awards received for “Most Inspirational Leader” between choir and soccer. But somewhere along the way, and maybe only in the last few years, I became a little less hopeful. A little more suspicious.
Whether toward circumstances or people, the level of cynicism in my heart grew to unfamiliar levels. It’s difficult not to internalize the anger or disappointment from relationships gone wrong or moments of massive miscommunication. Somehow, I became a person hellbent on feeling all my feelings, even when they’re not healthy or helping me.
Now, hear me when I say that feelings and emotions are simply information. They’re not inherently bad and each one can give us a direction needed to make a better decision. Yet, at the moment, they can unhinge the calmest demeanor. And that’s what happened to me. I’ve never been accused of having a calm demeanor, but I carry my story with an expectation of hope — the heavy things will not be heavy forever.
So, as I’ve noticed, the last few years have been a season of feeling a little more melancholy. How can I move back to myself? How can I return to an ability to remember the beauty, uncover the hope, and recognize the hurt in situations without obsessing over the memory or fearing overtly painful positivism?
By keeping a shorter memory. Do you ever notice that when some people answer the question of how they're doing, they recount all the frustrations from the day right away? Much like I started this story, I was able to remember and share quickly because each return to our garage door was punctuated with the keypad acting strangely as well. The frustration was on the front of my mind.
Yet as we walked, I thought about how I could keep a shorter memory about the start of our walk. I determined that when I returned to the house, I would not tell of the little hiccups at the start. Just because they happened didn’t mean I needed to repeat them verbally when we walked back through the door.
But let’s address the obvious: writing an essay about small annoyances is hardly forgetting them. Perhaps I would have done better to let them pass without another thought. And yet, if I am going to be a woman ready to feel her feelings as they arise, I need to feel these too. Especially because these are the feelings that reminded me it is possible to keep a shorter memory in life and remain present, wholehearted, and without an attitude of minimizing in the process.
It’s no small thing that I spent the first eight minutes of my morning walk running back-and-forth like a Supermarket Sweep contestant with the bonus inflatable prizes. It’s equally not small that I had the mental space to consider each interruption to my intention as simply that: a quick interruption.
These weren’t milk spills in the dairy aisle without warning. I wasn’t in danger, nor would I fail to follow through on my walk because of the hindrances. So when I finally returned home to the kind and invitational “How was your walk?” question, I was prepared and hopeful.
“Honestly, we hit a few speed bumps first thing, but once we were on the move, it was a wonderful way to wake up for a Monday.”
This wasn’t dishonest. I could have shared my stories and received a bit of sympathy, but I’m completely done with sympathy these days. There’s too much going around, masquerading as empathy because, truthfully, we’ve not experienced loss and chaos on such a scale as we are right now. Empathy comes from understanding and compassion. Unless my husband had experienced such a litany of disruptions on a walk of his own, first thing in the morning, it would be sympathy. They’re not life-altering moments, so why should they be included as the important details?
Because like in this story, they were important details. The next time you encounter your day with an incorrect cup of coffee, a cellphone battery unexpectedly dying, or missing a green light, pause.
Ask if this is something worth recounting in your next face-to-face conversation. Does this issue change the narrative of your day? Does it change your story or who you are? If you overthink the moment, will it change how you approach the next thing you do, or the next barista you encounter?
If it will, then you have a choice to make. The people in your life who are consistently upset about circumstances outside of their control are communicating with you they are not happy. I don’t think we realize how obvious that statement is, because we want to believe our people are happy and healthy all the time.
But the truth is that so many of us are ruminating on what has gone wrong. We’re too obsessed with a long memory; a record of iniquities we can wield as a weapon anytime our fire is stoked to anger.
But anger is just another bit of information — another moment of wisdom we can choose to curiously observe. We have a choice to become people who see our emotions and moments of upset as opportunity, or we can choose to keep those annoying memories like a rash on our skin: obvious to others, irritating to us, and distracting from the real beauty that lies beneath.
Today, my disruptions and I are choosing opportunity. Rather than starting with an attitude: “Nothing ever goes my way,” or, “Of course something would try to stop me from trying to take care of the dog and my body,” I’m starting my day with a choice of revelation.
This isn’t a choice to work solely inline with my gut optimism, nor to dismiss the natural pessimism we naturally obtain as we age. This is my choice to live in a way I want to live, without submitting simply to my nature as set and unchanging. This is the manifestation of my choice to choose.
Mandy Capehart is an author, small business owner, editor, certified grief and life coach, and creator of The Restorative Grief Project. The Restorative Grief Project is an online community focusing on one another’s stories and new methodologies for grief, creating a safe environment for our souls to heal and our spirits to be revived. To learn more, visit MandyCapehart.com or follow her on Twitter. She thinks she is pretty funny. The jury is out.
