Interrupting Our Past, Creating Our Future

Have you ever said to yourself, “From now on, I will…(listen, be patient, be loving, take risks, etc.) and then find yourself behaving as you always have?

Do you find it fascinating that we say we want to change, we know what we need to do to change, we make plans to change and, yet, we don’t change? We keep repeating the same behavior over and over and over again which, of course, is the definition of insanity.

If so, this article is for you.

My thoughts are inspired by a remarkable documentary being shown on “Frontline” on PBS called “The Interrupters.” It’s the story of former gang members in Chicago who put their lives at risk by inserting themselves into situations where gang violence may occur in an attempt to interrupt the fighting.

What’s clear is that the cycle of violence will continue forever unless it is interrupted. This is as true of gang violence as it is of warfare as it is of any relationship that we kill off by refusing to forgive and declare “it stops with me.”

Ameena Matthwes is one of these interrupters. Ameena tells the story of how she had been molested by her mother’s boyfriend when she was a young girl. After that incident, Ameena said that if someone so much as inadvertently bumped into her at school, she would get furious and be ready to fight.

Ameena’s anger is, of course, perfectly understandable and not only because of the sexual molestation. If you’ve ever become furious when someone cuts you off in traffic, disagrees with a strongly held belief or doesn’t acknowledge a contribution you’ve made, you can relate to Ameena. Like Ameena who became furious when bumped in school, your anger may be out of proportion to the actual incident.

The reason it’s out of proportion to the actual incident is because it’s not the actual incident to which you are responding just as Ameena wasn’t responding to being bumped in a store. You are responding to something that happened in your past and you made a decision about how you would behave in your future to a real or imagined threat. As Laurence Gonzales notes in his book, “Everyday Survival,” When we do things that don’t make sense, we’re responding from our past.”

A common example may have occurred in school. The teacher asked a question. You were sure you knew the answer. You vigorously waved you hand in the air, desperate to be called on. The teacher called on you and…you gave the wrong answer. Your classmates laughed and, perhaps some of the less empathetic ones called you “stupid.” What decisions might you have made at that moment?

Well, if, today, you find yourself nervous about speaking in groups, you may have decided that you would never let yourself be embarrassed again. If you get furious at someone who cuts you off in traffic, you may have decided that no one would ever take advantage of you again. If you are angry because you weren’t acknowledged for something you did, you may have decided that no matter what you do, you’ll never get the credit you deserve. You may want to confront someone and you don’t do so because you made the decision that it isn’t safe to speak up. You may have trouble listening to feedback because you made the decision that what others say about you is painful to hear.

Who knows what decisions a seven year old may have made?

The reason we try to change and don’t is because we keep trying to change our past instead of creating a new future free from that past. Our behavior in the present may not make sense to us because it’s how a 7 year old would behave. A 7 year old is, literally, running our lives in certain instances.

The past, of course, can’t be changed. That’s why it’s called The Past.

In his book “Wisdom of the Ages,” Wayne Dyer notes that we have about 60,000 thoughts every day. The problem is that they tend to be the same 60,000 thoughts repeated over and over again. This is as good an explanation as any of how our past becomes our future.

Until they stop living their past over and over and over again, those Chicago street gangs will remain in a cycle of violence. Unless we stop reliving our past, we are doomed to endlessly repeat our own cycles of unresolved conflicts.

Change occurs when we create a future that doesn’t include a recreation of the past.