Learning a lesson or being stuck the past?

It's important to learn from what happens to us, and not make the same mistake repeatedly. How do we deal with people who then think we're stuck in the past simply because we are trying to apply the lesson we learned?

I discussed an example with my therapist. ****Possible trigger; I'm going to talk about a minor accident.**** When I was a teenager, I was walking home from school and started to cross a driveway. A lady, sitting there in her car, was waiting to make a turn. She was watching for traffic to clear in one direction, and I approached from the opposite side. Just as I was starting to pass in front of her, she pulled out, clipped me with her front fender, and knocked me down. I couldn't move out of the way fast enough. I wasn't hurt, but I might have fainted from fright, because the next thing I knew, I was waking up in the road with her standing over me, asking me if I was OK. No long-term damage came from this. I ended up with only a little scrape on my elbow.

Ever since, and it's been quite a few years, I have made it a strict policy to always make eye contact with the driver before I walk in front of an idling car. I don't take a step until I am absolutely sure the driver knows I'm there.

Sometimes in this kind of situation, people face resistance. "Quit being silly. That happened so long ago, and it was only one time. You need to leave the past in the past. You can't go around thinking every car you see might knock you down." My therapist told me that I would be "stuck in the past" and "not letting it go" if I were to never again leave my house because I might get knocked down by a car. But merely being careful any time I pass in front of one, she agrees, is just plain learning a lesson. What if I continued stepping out in front of cars without making sure the driver sees me, figuring that what happened that one time is in the past? Wouldn't that be pretty stupid of me?

What about other situations? Where is the line drawn between taking precautions and being "paranoid" as some people might call it? You don't want to marry a heavy drinker because a parent was an alcoholic. "You need to move on. That was then, this is now. Don't make him pay for what your father did." You break up with a partner and won't get back together. "Oh, come on, get over the past. I said I was sorry." (Yeah, but you don't see them changing their behavior any, right?)

I quite often get accused of overreacting and/or being paralyzed with fear, when I merely won't go down that road again.

Any input on the subject?

Well, I totally relate.

And I think if people were totally honest, they would relate too. Sometimes I think people who say those things are in denial about their own feelings.

Quite recently a psychologist explained it by saying that the trauma we experience gets stored in our "long term memory" section of our brain. And we need to get it out of there, have it gone. He said the "memory" won't go away by itself. We have to work on it with therapy. (He is an advocate for ERDM therapy for PTSD).

No one should put you/anyone down like that, try not to let them get to you. Take care.