Visiting with my son, daughter-in-law and their two children ages two and four, I am enjoying the luscious fruit of their hard work growing children who feel loved, secure and considerate of others. They have managed to raise children balanced with a true sense of themselves and an accountability for their treatment of others. An amazing feat, even though they could both use more sleep!
From time to time I hear my son recount two stories about his father that were uncomfortable for the children and me when they happened. Over the years, my son changed what happened in his telling the stories to his children to be funny anecdotes that we could laugh at and learn lessons from. I was surprised at first since I felt an obligation to remember the past exactly as it happened. But now I see it differently. Why not rewrite (or reframe, as psychologists say) past occurrences into stories that make us feel better? Why do we have to carry hurts, insults and fears that make us feel angry every time that we hear them just because we remember feeling that way at the time? We can release the need to extract revenge and carry forward revised stories that soothe us. The past doesn’t exist anymore anyway, so why not carry parts of it forward with our own special twist?
Beautiful story Ellie. Retelling the events as they happened keeps them alive along with all the hurts and feelings. Telling the story with a grateful heart for the wisdom it gave you causes you to celebrate your life exactly as it unfolded. <3