Put yesterday aside. Where are you at right now and where you want to go to from here?
You’ll have noticed in one of my earlier posts that this tenet is one of the foundations of my philosophy.
Have you ever been for a walk in the park with someone – your cousin perhaps – who clearly hasn’t put yesterday aside? “Goodness me, isn’t she going on and on and on – again,” you think. ““She’s been divorced for two years. And she’s still going on about her marriage. Like a broken gramophone record (whatever that may be).” And then you add to yourself, “What a bore. In fact so boring, I’m surprised she doesn’t bore herself.”
Well, here’s the thing: perhaps she does!
To unpack the idea of putting yesterday aside so as stop boring yourself and to move forward towards horizons that are somewhat more invigorating, let’s look at a real life example. We’ll look at it from the point of view of:
- Where are we at today?
- What happened yesterday to bring us here?
- Where do we want to go to from here?
- How are we to get there?
Here we go:
- Where are we at today?
Tanya and Jake have been divorced for two years (a bit like that cousin you took a walk with). The children (a 5-year old and a 3-year old) live with Tanya and spend alternate weekends with their dad.
The encounters between Tara and Jake when he comes to collect the children are fraught, with Tara giving full vent – in the presence of the children – to her hostility to their dad. Tara then spends the weekend consumed by anger at having to share the children with him and with fantasies of revenge for his infidelities. Brooding all weekend, she’s not able to take advantage of her free time to do something productive or pleasurable.
2. What happened yesterday to bring us here?
Jake was unfaithful during the marriage. He wasn’t particularly discreet about his infidelities, but, all the same, Tara was the last to find out. This compounded her outrage. The divorce was a messy affair, with contentious negotiations about finances and about custody of and access to the children.
Back to the present:
Tara admits that, rotten as Jake was as a husband, he was (except by way of having cheated on the mother of his children) – and still is – a good father: involved, fair, fun, and supportive of Tara discipline-wise. Moreover, despite her open hostility, he is civil and courteous when he collects and returns the children.
3. Where do we want to go to from here?
Upon reflection, Tara acknowledges that dwelling on the marriage and the reasons for its failure embeds her in the past. Her preoccupation with Jakes’ infidelities inform and determine her life-style in the present. She recognises that, if she were to put yesterday aside, she may well be able to live more pleasurably in the present and to plan more enthusiastically for the future.
4. How are we to get there?
In the years since becoming a parent, Tanya has had little opportunity to indulge her passion for hiking. She now decided that, instead of spending her weekends wandering aimlessly around the house waiting for the children to come back, she would join a hiking club.
Her hostility to Jake didn’t automatically and instantly evaporate. But, as she grew physically fitter and made new friends, she became more poised, and the encounters with Jake became less fraught. As an unexpected but welcome consequence, the children also became more contented.
By suggesting that you put yesterday aside, I am not blithely suggesting that you forget about yesterday. Rather, I invite you to strive to come to terms with what happened yesterday (or last year or in 1998) – and that you do this by focusing on where you are today and where you’d like to be tomorrow. ‘Putting yesterday aside’ doesn’t mean peremptorily discounting what happened in the past. Rather, it is a process – a process of coming to terms with the past with the goal of freeing yourself from its tyranny, so that you can enjoy the present and look forward to the future.
A future-focused orientation is, in my view, a more efficient and less painful approach to problem-solving than is a past-focused one. While Tara’s challenge centres around divorce, the principles are the same no matter whether your ‘yesterday’ involves a relationship or work or finances or fishing (remember the one that got away?).
Let’s not diminish the impact of the past. Sometimes the past can be dealt with fairly brusquely, but sometimes not. It’s probably easier to forgive your father for having cheating in your scrabble game last week than it is to come to terms with your spouse having cheated on you in marriage. Bad things in a marriage or in our childhood or while we’re serving in the armed forces can cast long shadows over our lives. Be realistic about how long it can take and how hard it might be to work through those traumas. But do so always with a focus on the future.
I hope that the plan of action I have outlined in this post may help you to do this. But if you feel that some help in negotiating that plan might be useful, please message me. Before you do so, you may find it helpful to read about my approach to counselling, mentoring and life-coaching.
