Memories of Lived Environments - Day 59

I am on day 4 now of the final section of DIP Lite, wherein I am working with memories. What I notice already is that I continually have a hard time "coming up" with memories when prompted to write about one with a "positive/feeling attachment." I think that the reason for this is that so often, within my "positive/feeling attachment" memories, I also experience regret, where I "miss" the content of that memory and wish that I could still have the content of that memory here now. And this is sort of the point of working with these memories -- seeing how having a positive/feeling attachment to a memory limits me within experiencing my present as the here & now. But I tend to be so caught up in regret and missing and wishing that even "positive" memories for me are "negative" because I rarely think back on a memory and just smile and experience only positive feelings.

In large part this might be because regret is so strong within me that I tend to only think of positive/feeling attachment memories wherein I regret the decisions I have made to make those memories rather than realities, where I remember these memories and know that I have changed aspects of my physical environment (location, mainly) in such a way that I can never even try to replicate those memories even closely, because I am no longer in that place or with those people.

But this is all the more limiting because within this I sit idly by and watch these memories in my mind and feel hopeless/helpless that I cannot ever experience these things again, and then I resent myself for the decisions I have made to change my life in a way that the replication of these memories is impossible, and I resent the way that my life physically is now because it is not what it was. So here I am perceiving what my life is not rather than seeing what it is, and also I am limiting my ability to create new experiences for myself and experience new situations and also I am limiting myself in what I believe are the necessary "ingredients" (people, places) for the enjoyment of life, wherein I believe that I cannot enjoy life because I do not still live in Denver with my old friends.

And here too I have to "remember" that even if I did still live in Denver, many of my friends there have moved away, or the people in my apartment complex have moved to different living situations, or many of my old coworkers have moved on to different jobs.

So everyone and everything has changed and shifted, as this is what life does. And yet I imprison myself within my mind within my memories of this time where these memories have a positive/feeling attachment but even here I do not allow myself to "fondly remember" these times and to even really experience the positive/feeling attachment but instead go straight to regret and resentment of myself and my decisions and my current living situation, which is my home, my friends, my job, my community, the weather, etc.

So I notice that most of the time that I remember my life in Denver I remember it within regret and also resentment and a kind of powerlessness because I know I cannot turn back time. What is the solution here? I'm not sure. Initial response is to try to not think about Denver, but that's just suppression isn't it? So, release myself of the feeling/emotion attachments I have to my life in Denver, my past? Commit and apply myself to my present in the here & now? Stop allowing myself to come up with bullshit "buts" for why life here can't be however I want it to be, for why I am limited in my location in who I can be. Stop allowing myself to exist in my mind in my past. Stop allowing myself to wish I could turn back time.


I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to wish I could turn back time.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to create and then foster and fester regret.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I am limited in my enjoyment of life because my life is not taking place in Denver, in the past.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to so often look back rather than looking at what is here now in front of me in the physical as the "ingredients" with which I can work.

I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to consider how to make my life "work" here and then done the work for that to happen. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I should be "magically happy" on the basis of my environment without having to do anything to make my environment supportive or to support myself within my environment. I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to place my source of contentment and satisfaction outside myself.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to continually get caught up in regret and "what if" and "but it's not the same."

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to neglect the here & now and to neglect myself within the here & now.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to neglect my lived environment such that I do not take care of household responsibilities so that I am always existing under the pressure of tasks which I have established within myself as undesirable to do and am always living in an environment which I have established within myself as unpreferable as compared to my memories of old living situations.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to resent a physical space as my living environment wherein I blame the physical space and not myself for my relationship with this space where I expect the space itself to be positive and productive and light and cheerful and free and open rather than directing myself to experience myself and my space this way, or freeing myself of these things altogether and simply being in the here & now without judgment but with responsibility for tasks and chores and obligations as well as self-expression and enjoyment.


When and as I see myself remembering my life in Denver in regret and helplessness and resentment, I stop and I breathe. I realize that my memories are not real: they are fictitious creations of my imagination based on experiences, feelings, emotions, images, interpretations, fears, and desires. I realize that even if my memories were completely real (accurate), they are not here & now, and so I realize that within my memories I am limiting myself in the here and now in the physical and I am creating a dissonance for myself, enslaving myself to and as my mind as my memories as what I cannot have, not looking at what I can have or what I can create or what is already here or who I am within all of this and how I have created all of this and how I continue to create myself and my experiences in every moment. I commit myself to investigating my memories and my relationship to and as regret, resentment, and wishful thinking. I commit myself to bringing myself back to and as my breath, in the physical, in the here & now, as one as equal as LIFE as what is best for all, directing myself through and as every moment within self-honesty and self-responsibility, as the creator & destroyer of myself through what I accept and allow.


When and as I see myself existing in my lived environment within passivity and resentment wherein I am seeing that "I do not like" aspects of my living space but that I don't do anything about that energetic experience / judgment, I stop and I breathe. I realize that I create my relationship with my environment and to a certain extent I create my environment, and here I am neglecting to do either in a self-supportive way. I commit myself to taking care of my environment and supporting myself through the creation of an enjoyable living space and through releasing myself of my negative associations and resentments with my living space such that this space is what I make it and I will make it into a self-supportive space for myself.

Here I notice that I doubt or question myself as who I am within this because I have this judgment in me that says I should be able to "be okay" no matter what my living space is like, I should be able to direct myself to "be okay" and also to take care of responsibilities no matter what (and therefore I shouldn't bother cleaning or organizing or trying to make my environment "enjoyable"). And what "responsibilities" here even really matter other than paying bills and other external logistical responsibilities? Who am I in "wanting" a "clean environment" or an environment which feels "open" or is decorated nicely and "looks nice"? Am I limiting myself further by trying to imagine how I would like my environment to look (I know that I often will envision/imagine a certain room arrangement, for example, or home feature, and then I will think "life will be so much better when" that arrangement is changed or when I live somewhere with that feature, where I am abdicating responsibility for myself in creating myself within the space I already presently have)? Am I establishing that I will not be "okay" until my environment looks a certain way? I know that I enjoy having a clean living space but I also know that I continually face the task of cleaning, organizing, and keeping things as such, as a challenge. So who am I in all of this? 


Possibly more on this as well as the commitments that I made to myself 6-8 months ago when I was looking forward to living by myself in this apartment, and also specifics of my current apartment as well as comparisons I have drawn from memories of my old job to new jobs I have had here.