Unhappy in the Present?  

Viewpoint from Kennedy Shultz.

What has happened to us in the past is never what is making us unhappy in the present. Our present unhappiness is always generated out of our present activity -- mental activity that is. When we think of what has happened in the past in a mournful, resentful or otherwise negative way, it is happening all over again in the present. Our life is full of it just as surely as if we were back there going through it for the first time.

People defend rehashing past hurts and disappointments by claiming they are trying to resolve the issue.  They really are not trying to do that at all.  They are trying to relive the event and make it come out different.  But they are only half successful.  They certainly succeed at reliving the negative event, but they never make it come out different.  It always comes out the same, with them on the hurting end. 

This is more than a personal problem.  It does not merely bring unhappiness to the person who is doing it, but it affects the way that person deals with other people, form cab drivers and waitresses to co-workers and employees to family and friends.

So if you catch yourself at this sort of thing understand that you are not merely a poor soul suffering for your past, you are a public nuisance.  And if you think nobody likes you very much, you are probably right.

Cut it out.  It's a one-way ticket to loneliness.


"Be Willing to have it so.  Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune."

William James