Past, present, and future (how to move through challenges graciously)
By Evelyn Behrends
Our life is made of three parts, the past, the present and the future.
It is easy to get caught in one phase or another. It is easy for us to give a lot of our energy to the past. Reliving old experiences, feeling pain that a chapter is over, and recounting regrets about when things didn’t go our way. Overall, feeling stuck in these energies of the past can often manifest as depression. We all deserve to be happy, and there are ways to move out of the depression, and move more fully into the present. Try these techniques below and see how they work for you.
Reliving old experiences + Recounting regrets
How to move on? We can get caught in the cycle of thinking over our past actions, feeling regretful, wishing we had done something differently, and feeling so much shame and even anger at ourselves for not doing better. But the truth is, you did the best you could with what you had and knew at the time! Try this, imagine yourself as a child. Would you be as harsh with them as you are maybe being with yourself? I fully believe that we all deserve kindness, gentleness, and the understanding that we are only human. And yes, that includes you! It is okay to be imperfect, and we can be our harshest critics. There is a process of self compassion and self forgiveness here that will set us free, to stop living in the past, and bring our energy back to where we can actually make good use of it: the present.
Feeling pain that a chapter is over
When this is the case, it is often true that there is a grieving process that needs to take place. I speak from experience.
The best way to move through grief is to accept that it is a process that needs to happen, and allowing ourselves to move through it with COMPASSION. Compassion is the Compass.
It is said that grief is Love with nowhere to go, so if there is love we had in the past (for an idea, for a person, for an expectation) and the object of the love has left our lives, we need to move through a grieving process to allow our own love to come back to us, and move freely in our lives again.
Grief is different for everyone, but the main stages are as follows: Denial, Anger, Sadness, Bargaining, & Acceptance.
Denial
In Denial, we may not be admitting to ourselves that the object of our love has left our lives, in one way or another. A way to move through this stage is to recognize that we are using this denial to protect ourselves from the difficult emotions that follow (anger, sadness, etc.). Staying stuck in this stage is also painful, and I can promise you that there is a light at the end of the tunnel if you are willing to hold yourself and go through the grieving process. Allow yourself to recognize that the object of your love is truly gone, but importantly! that it will not be the only opportunity to have a similar sort of love in your life. If you have lost a lover, there will be another person out there for you, and you will experience great love again, but only when you have healed and are ready. If you have had to let go of an idea of yourself, there is a bright, shiny and beautiful new version of you waiting around the corner, it is a rebirth that you must go through, and an opportunity to feel new again, once you have allowed yourself to release the old. Like the leaves falling in Autumn or a snake shedding its skin, letting go is going to make way for growth and new life. If this is hard to believe right now, I am asking you to trust me. I speak from lived experience, and you are so loved, maybe more than you believe. You’ve got this <3 The faster you can move through this stage of letting go, the faster you can begin the healing process.
Anger
In the Anger stage, we may feel anger towards ourselves, other people involved, or the universe. It is common to feel like the situation was unjust , and maybe it was, but it is important to remember that this is only one chapter of your life, and your story isn’t over yet. Even feeling hopeless won’t last forever, and if you are reading this, it means you are a person who cares about helping themselves through the process, and that your hope is waiting for you in the near future. Things often make sense on a bigger timeline, and it is important to let yourself FEEL the FEELINGS so you can keep moving forward in a healthy way.
Sadness
Moving from the Anger stage to the Sadness stage can make us feel quite vulnerable. Anger is often a way that we protect ourselves from our sadness. I have said before that Anger is Sadness with teeth. These teeth can make us feel safe, but the point here is to recognize that you are safe to feel sadness too, and that it is something you can move through and into happier times, if you allow yourself to soften. Be your best friend when you feel sad. Others may not be able to hold you through this in the ways that you wish they would, but it is an opportunity to show up for yourself and practice loving up on yourself! Seek comfort by being your own lover, your own best friend, and giving yourself either what you want to receive, or what you would do for another going through what you are. I like to get myself flowers, take a bath, bring myself on coffee dates, light candles and see myself lovingly in a mirror, and to make sure that I am eating well enough and getting enough good water while I move through a sad chapter. Not only will you feel a bit better, and be further along in moving through your grief process, you will be opening up room for your OWN lost love to come back to you and begin moving through your life again in a healthy way. Forgive yourself for any mistakes you think you made, and remember that you were doing the best you could at the time. You won’t feel like this forever, and you are learning valuable self help skills along the way to make you more resilient, dynamic, confident, and self loving. One step at a time, and notice what you are doing RIGHT for yourself. <3
Bargaining
In the Bargaining stage, we begin to wonder if we could have done something differently, or if there are changes we could make to bring the object of our love back into our lives. Again, this could be a person, but also an idea, dream, or expectation that didn’t go as we had hoped.
Please remember that you did the best you could, and it is likely that you weren’t being fully appreciated for all of the great things about you.
The important thing here is to remember your own worth, and to thank yourself for doing the work to grow from the experience and show up differently in the future as needed. But in truth, the things that are meant for you in life, you won’t have to bargain for. You are worthy of so much, and the road ahead holds more progress for you and your happiness than the past ever will. I know it is hard but please trust me, the things that are meant for you will not pass you, and just because something is over doesn’t mean that it didn’t help you grow for a season of your life time. Thank it for what it was and trust that you are going to feel good when something new is the right fit for you. You have all you need within you, and sometimes rejection is just redirection.
When you release yourself from trying to change, shift, gift, or negotiate your way into getting the lost thing back, you will realize that you are still here, standing on the other side, still whole and complete, and soon feeling more positive for letting the past go.
Acceptance
Finally comes acceptance. You may still feel some echoes of the past stages, but overall you are finding your footing again, remembering your goodness, and feeling peace and happiness that you haven’t been able to access for a while. This will come in waves, starting as the occasional good few hours or happy moment, but they will become more and more frequent as you allow yourself to move through the process. Until one day, you begin to realize that you feel better, and are more able to appreciate the present moment and the hope that it brings for the future.
I am so proud of you, wherever you are in the process. There is growth in every stage, and you are doing a huge favor for yourself by moving through this process. It isn’t easy, but I can promise it is worth it. Every bit of love, compassion, & grace you can give to yourself builds you a safer inner landscape, and this will only ever call more goodness into your life.
If you need more support moving through this process, check out our grief workbook, or schedule a healing session with one of our energy workers.
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