If I Can’t Rewind, Why I Do I Keep Hitting Replay?
I play past encounters over and over in my head.
Negative encounters, of course. Why would I waste my time revisiting moments that made me happy? No, I keep looking back at moments wherein I embarrassed myself, got hurt or hurt someone else. I often think about what I would do or say differently, but mostly I just torture myself with these events.
Here’s the best part. I am not talking about things that have happened in the last few years. I replay the camp dance I went to at age 12 in the same technicolor as I play a dismissive classmate at grad school.
VHS Replay
Why, oh why do I do this?
I can’t go back and fix it.
That’s clear. If Einstein didn’t figure out time travel, it’s not going to be this girl. (My two physics classes in college are the very reason I graduated cum laude instead of magma cum laude. True story.) If I can’t go back and make it better, why do I hold those scenes close with my emotional remote?
I don’t want to watch this show anymore.
I want to let go of what I can’t change. I need to accept that all of these mistakes and hurts make me who I am today. That’s the advice I would give anyone else yet I don’t live that. I keep pulling up the comfy chair to the VCR of my life (yes, I said VCR - I’m old) and replaying those scenes again and again.