Past and Prejudice

I want to ramble about the past, not just in a nostalgic way but also how I remember it.

Photo by Etienne Girardet on Unsplash

And here it is.

Past is sometimes colorful, like the times I recall a fond memory, me and my mom eating grilled fish in a no frills restaurant in Eminönü with a view of the bright blue sea. Galata Tower is visible and huge in the sky. Sun is warming my cheeks. We gossip, we eat and we laugh. She smokes a cigarette, I think to myself why on earth she wants to poison herself and dirty the fresh sea air we’re breathing in. Then, I see how she enjoys the bitter taste of tobacco, it settles her nerves, and I say to myself it’s okay.

Past is gray when I remember the times I have to say goodbye to the people I love. Even though I know I will see them again. I just hate goodbyes. I think the reason I hate them so much is the fact that it’s a mutual feeling and yet you have to feel it alone. I’m especially talking about the ones at the airport. I am in the line, skipping through security, my family can’t go there, but they wave back at me with teary eyes. We all force a smile so that we trick each other and ourselves into thinking we will be all fine. Even writing about this now, I just hate it.

What is intriguing about the past though is my relationship to it. By some random statistics I determined in my head that I tend to remember good memories only 15% of the time and the rest 85% consists of the gray ones. This is not because my life was bad most of the time. On the contrary, I have had a good share of both colorful and gray memories. Maybe even more of the colorful ones than the gray ones, but how does the mind dilute the colorful memories to the point, gray is more dominant and it turns all the other ones into mud?

Perhaps it has to do with the stories we tell to ourselves about our past. Those stories become legends and we never dare to change or challenge the validity of them. We turn those stubborn stories into a faux religion. I think from my own experience I realized it’s harder to change the stories because I am afraid to face the fact that I’m not the same person. Letting go of the past and retelling your story is kind of like “killing your darlings”—that writer's trick where you delete a beloved sentence or passage for the sake of the greater story.

So lately, I’ve been trying to retell these stories in my head. I thought it was equally possible to invest my effort into creating a fresher version of these gray stories so when I remembered them again, they would turn more colorful.

Here’s a recent example from my own life:

Old story: I used to believe I wasn’t a selfless and kind person, and this is why some of my relationships failed.

Reality: I didn’t realize at the time that I was just a perfectionist. I had no concept of boundaries and over extended myself to others. This in turn created resentfulness when I didn’t see the same care and love, both in terms of effort and time.

New story: I didn’t have the same insight into who I was, I came across as unkind and selfish when I demanded more care and love. I deserve the same care and love I extend to others and happy to see those relationships ended. In the future, with the help of my new boundaries, right people will find me.

I do feel exposed to share this kind of intimate knowledge about myself, but I think this is why I write. I know I am not the only one who feels this way. I also want to challenge you, too, dear reader. Try this, pick a story where you’ve convinced yourself to be a victim, or evil or unkind or unfair, and rewrite the story. Maybe in this new story you aren’t the victim or the evil person you thought you were, perhaps there were deeper layers which were hidden underneath the dark corners of your mind.

My rambling has come to an end. Thank you for letting me. In the meantime, just try it, pick a memory that haunts you. Write it down and then try to change the ending. Rip the page into pieces and throw it out if it helps. Just make sure somehow you’re convinced that the old story is dead and there is a new one now.

Until next time…