Adding to my Toolbox: Releasing the Past

I’ve discovered some videos that have changed me in the most miraculous ways. These videos are put forth by Matt Kahn and you can find them on YouTube.

He addresses a wide variety of spiritual issues – from his interactive lectures I’ve learned more in 90 minutes about loving myself and claiming my birthright of God’s love than I have in the last 40-some years. He’s incredible, check him out if you have a chance.

One of the things I love deeply about Matt’s style is that he doesn’t run from trauma, or pain, or human-ness, or everyday life, or feelings, or bullshit. He takes everything head-on. And while he doesn’t run from any of it, he also refuses to roll around and get mired down in any of it. It’s all taken in stride, all with the overarching theme of “This, too, shall pass.”

I’m someone who often over-analyzes things and I allow myself to hold onto things by indulging in never-ending thought-loops about them. Which is why sometimes I have difficulty processing stuff and moving forward from it – or why this has been harder for me in the past than its now, I should say.

Watching Matt’s videos has given me some more tools to add to my toolbox – more effective tools. It’s as though I was using basic hand-tools like screwdrivers and hammers before, and Matt’s helped me upgrade to pneumatic nail guns and power drills.

His methods may seem a little odd and certainly unorthodox to some, but I honestly feel that if you’re honest with yourself, if you’re able meet yourself plainly and without distraction, his methods help more than all the self-help books you could devour in a decade.

I feel like he’s shown me my own power to put perspective to my struggles and challenges so that I no longer get lost within them for so long. I feel like I’ve gained a workable, spiritually aligned framework of looking at the world I encounter and tools for responding in a way that supports my growth and the growth of people I encounter.

I feel more empowered now than I ever have before, and I feel closer and more beloved by God than I ever have before as well. The combination is heady to say the least.

It’s been so powerful, in fact, that I‘m experiencing really weird things like losing track of the past. It’s like it just doesn’t matter to me anymore. When I listened to several of his talks over the course of last week, the result is that I got to Thursday and had almost NO RECOLLECTION of Monday through Wednesday. I couldn’t remember anything about any of those days except for my brother bringing my niece over to visit. Couldn’t remember anything I ate at any meal, couldn’t remember being at work or anything I did there, NOTHING. Couldn’t remember what I wore. Couldn’t remember walking my dog, even though I know all of that happened. I couldn’t even tell you what day it was on Thursday – I honestly had to check my phone to know what day it was.

It was pretty weird to look back at the preceding three days of my week and see a blank. But it was oddly … perfect. Because I’m just losing my interest all together in the past. What does it matter now?

It’s true that my past has made me who I am. I’ll never forget my childhood trauma or what it was like to heal from that. But living my life NOW, I don’t have to rehash every mistake I make, I don’t have to get lost in the insignificant details of my life and beat myself up about them; I can finally live the now, in the moments as they’re unfolding in front of me. They take care of themselves if I do what I need to do, and I move forward. I live in the present, which is the only place I have any real power or concern, right?

Right.

It feels freeing to not go and look back over the past – even if it was just a couple days ago. Who cares what I ate or wore to work? It’s done, over-with. I can free up that mental energy to do something else.

Living “in the now” used to be nothing but a modern, pseudo-spiritual catch-phrase I was sick of.

But I actually see that it’s something that can be done, and releasing ties to the past feels incredibly freeing. Like setting down a bag of bricks I’ve been toting on my back for no apparent reason.

Amen to that!