Remebrance of Things Past

Remembrance of Things Past

A friend of mine who has lost two parents and a brother in the past half dozen years recently began to reconnect with friends from his high school days. As I listened to him tell me about some of the things this had brought up, ideas occurred to me that I wanted to share because they reflect some principles we can all learn from.

The ensemble of characters cast in the dramas of their early years, now often referred to as the family of origin, were not cast in those roles for the rest of our lives. My friend's recent losses awakened in him a new found willingness to fashion a different ensemble of characters, one better suited to today. My friend's brother suffered a severe, persistent mental illness for more than forty years depriving my friend of many aspects of brotherly love he might otherwise have enjoyed. My friend was recreating a family.
We have all heard stories of individuals who overcome the wounds of childhood through a corrective experience in their adult years. A man who suffered unspeakable abuse from a tyrannical father is watched over by a teacher, a coach, or a boss and before long his pain is assuaged and the wounds begin to heal. Or perhaps we hear of a woman subjected to vicious and belittle attacks from a mother whose tenuous self-esteem was sustained by denigrating her defenseless daughter who is made right by a teacher or coworker who sees past the wounds to a realm the woman scarcely knew existed. There is a deep hunger to be mothered or fathered that does not leave us when we leave the first cast of characters in our life. But even when the stories are not so dire there we may benefit from a willing to keep an open casting call for characters in the current dramas of our life.
Principle 1: The opportunity to replace the members of our cast is often missed.

One of the guys with whom my friend had connected was a Jewish friend who had been a close buddy in grade school. They grew up in a town that was predominantly Irish and Italian. One day when the boys were in sixth grade, my friend said something anti-Semitic to hurt his Jewish friend's feelings. They must have gotten past it at the time because they remained acquaintances and partied together and high together in high school.
Nearly forty years later, these two boys reconnected and my friend took a courageous step by bringing up that fateful day when they were in sixth grade and he said something at changed their friendship forever. My friend apologized! His buddy let him know in the clearest way he knew that he did not even remember the remark or the day in question. My friend apologized again trying to reassure his high school mate that he did not grow up to be an anti-Semite. The guy told my friend he should let it go and that if he was seeking forgiveness for a crime that was not even remembered, he had it!
This brings me to another principle revealed in my friend's recent rekindling of high school friendships. We carry into our adult years countless regrets, shaming moments, and things that weigh us down. My friend was fortunate to have had the chance to surrender one of those ancient afflictions. But what about all the ones he carries that involve people he may never see again. If our capacity to release ourselves from neurotic guilt depends on the person we wronged or failed when we were younger we are likely to miss opportunities to release the flotsam and jetsam of our past.
if you were to meet someone from your past, someone you had wronged or injured consider, what can we expect. Perhaps like my friend, you would discover you had made a mountain out of a molehill and that the aggrieved party did not even remember the event that had weighed you down. Of course, your actions might have had a profound and untoward impact upon the person you wronged. If that is the case, you will find that they have either worked through the matter or they may have carried that wound around like a disfiguring scar. (I am assuming that you have outgrown, transcended, suspended, or otherwise dealt with whatever behavior or tendency that caused you to behave badly. If not, you may deserve suffer a bit.) But if you have changed from the person you were, then you need not carry around neurotic guilt.
Principle 2: Don't wait to meet the person you've wronged to receive the forgiveness you need!

My friend was deeply moved by the fact that many of his friends had traversed similar paths In their lives as the ones he had traversed. In several instances, he was aware of forks in the road of life where he and the newly rediscovered friends had similar choices to make or challenges to meet. What he learned was that while each one of us has a story that is unique many of the elements of our story turn out to be universal. It is a good idea to remember that our story is uniquely ours. But it also helps to remember that our story is likely to have quite a bit in common with other's stories. Principle 3: What happens to us is seldom a first nor will it be a last.

Finally, my friend admitted to ambivalent feelings about the way his high school friends were reaching out to him. He had missed a high school reunion and his friend. One of them told my friend how much that he and a few of others had wanted to get together again and include him. My friend admitted that the prospects of rekindling these old acquaintances as real friendships provoked a mixture of feelings he was was unprepared for. He was deeply touched by their longing to be close but like Pandora's box, the invitation had loosed a fury of old maladies. He felt some of the same emotions he thought he had left behind in high school. I don't know whether my friend will take another step toward intimacy with his old chums; I hope he does. No matter how old we are, some of the same struggles to love and be loved will hang around. The question will one day become clear that we don't have to act like we did when we youngsters. Regardless of what he chooses, there was a lesson revealed in his ambivalence.
Principle 4: Be real, follow your heart, and open your heart to love.