Every day anew

We should really be able to start each day anew, I thought as I considered the recent changes to Ode. Why is it so difficult to let go of the past? Why do we cling so stubbornly to things that are over and done, to painful memories or bad experiences? These questions are a theme running through my life and over the years I’ve put them to the wise people I’ve had the privilege of meeting. And in the 10 years I’ve written for Ode I’ve met a number of wise people who’ve given me a number of answers.

In India I met Dadi Janki, a yogini and head of the Brahma Kumaris Spiritual University. I know few people who are as present in the here and now as she. Her secret: Dadi rounds off each day before she begins a new one. Every evening she asks herself how her day was. Did she hurt anyone? Does she need to make amends? Is there something she needs to say or someone she needs to forgive? Before she closes her eyes she makes her amends—sometimes personally and sometimes by sending an apology, thanks or love in her thoughts. When she wakes up in the morning, everything is clean and new.

The Dutch physicist Marinus Knoope also taught me how important it is to let go of the past. He says there is only one way to do that, which is to completely allow it. “When you don’t resist the past, but completely allow it, it loses its power,” he says. “When you embrace what is, you discover it is not negative. There’s nothing wrong with your emotions. Things only get tricky when you’re not allowed to experience them. Sadness or anger don’t hurt. It is the resistance to the emotion that hurts. When you can truly receive and experience the pain, it will be transformed into strength.”

But when we don’t face the past and process it, it continues to repeat itself. Which is why the work of psychologist and conceiver of Non-Violent Communication Marshall Rosenberg involves bringing together the victims and perpetrators of serious violent crimes. Rosenberg discovered that when the offenders and their victims listened to each other’s deepest pain as well as their motives—however hard that might be—they were able to process the pain and move on with their lives. Rosenberg calls it empathy and says: “I’ve yet to meet someone who still wanted revenge after he or she was truly heard.”

According to Rosenberg the first step towards empathy—not only for others but for ourselves—is learning to bring to light what is going on and hurts inside you right now. “Essentially you need to slow down and stop a moment and look at what’s going on inside you,” he says. “Call it meditation.” Perhaps, I thought, Rosenberg is putting his finger exactly on the painful spot. Maybe the fact that most people barely take the time to look inside and discover what’s going on is the reason why they’re getting stuck in the past.

The renowned Italian psychiatrist Pierro Ferrucci thinks so. To his mind, daily meditation is just as important as going to the toilet. How else can you let go of all the “crap” from the past? Ferrucci: “We treat ourselves pretty badly. We barely take the time to get to know ourselves. Our culture suffers from an overdose of action and a shortage of contemplation. I see contemplation as a basic need. You even see it in animals. Dogs or cats, for example, will often sit staring into the distance. We have the same need. A basic physiological need we deny. It’s as if an entire society is forgetting to go to the toilet. That’s serious!”

Those of us who want to start each day anew need do nothing more than fully embrace the past, properly round off each day and regularly go to the toilet.