I cannot stop thinking what I could have done differently.

[Nadosa]

I am addicted to living in the past. It is especially obvious in the relationship with my girlfried. I am pretty young, insecure, half awake, half asleep. I have one part in my mind that is so obsessive, full of OCD, that I am literally addicted to thinking about what I could have done better or differently everytime I meet my girlfriend and something bad happens. Due to the fact that I am not fully awake, she probably can't take me seriously or create an image of me, my frame is basically really volatile.

That means, last time, for example, I hurt her, ignored her because I felt badly treated (no I just was a pussy) and instead of listening to my heart and being there for her and ignoring her drama, I really just gave a fuck. And now I feel guilty, because it obviously hurt our relation.

But that is not the only case. Also, in genereal, when something bad happens, I ALWAYS have to recall it hours/days later, what exactly happened, I have to recheck, go into my memory and cant sit still until I figure out what really happened and reassure that this and that happened.

You wont believe how much energy it takes for me. 

What I basically think it is something my ego clings to in order to keep its identity alive, because when I am not triggered, my ego is threatened, because I have come up to many realizations the past months.

I really dont know what to do about this.

[Forestluv]

When unwelcomed intrusive thoughts appear in the mind, there can be a desire to repress them or seek relief from them . I've found trying to push away or avoid intrusive thoughts often makes it worse. This sets up an internal conflict of "I can't stop obsessing about the past. I'm always living in the past. I want it to stop". . . This creates two polar oppsosites: We are trapped 100% in OCD past and seek 100% relief from it. Yet ime, that dynamic is a trap. It creates an unnecessary conflict.

It's not so much the engagement with the past, it is the frequency and intensity of the engagement. A couple years ago, I asked myself "What proportion of my time do I spend engaged in the past?". It was a really high number. Like 80% of my day. This was too much. I wanted to spend more time living in the present moment. Yet I also don't want 0% of my time engaging in the past. How could I possibly survive if I never considered the past?  As well, I want to spend some time in personal reflection. Part of personal growth is to reflect upon our past and grow. So rather than trying to push away any thoughts of the past, I had a goal of reducing my time spent living in the past from 80% of my life down to 60%. Then if I could do that, then perhaps I could reduce it down further into a healthy zone of 40% or so. . . 

One thing I found was that I had a lot of mental conditioning of living in the past. One thing I found helpful was to designate a certain amount of time to "now". I dedicated 30min. a day to Now. Sorta like going to the gym each day. I had a "Now" workout. I would do something that helped relax the mind and put me in now. For example, yoga, art, gardening or walking in nature. Something in which I was engaged in the moment. When intrusive thoughts arose I would acknowledge it and gently tell my mind "This is *now time*. You will have plenty of time later to obsess about the past. Yet for this 30min. is *now time*". This helped relaxed my mind. . . I started off having very short glimpses of being now. Perhaps a 10 second gap. Yet with more and more practice, those gaps started stretching into minutes. I remember walking through nature one time appreciating the beauty of nature. I listened to the bird calls and wondered how the birds communicate with each other. Do birds have language? I noticed dragonflies dancing in the air with each other. So beautiful. Then I realized I didn't have an intrusive thought of the past for 5 min.!! It was so amazing and gave me hope that I could actually have a portion of my life living in the present moment. I just did for 5 min.!!. . . I would do my 30min. *now* workout daily. After a few weeks, I started getting better and noticed that brief moments of now started appearing in my regular day. I'd be doing something at work and realize I was Now for 30min. straight without even trying. 

Not only did I look at the quantity of time spent engaged in the past, I looked at the quality. I wanted my time reflecting about the past to be healthy. One thing I noticed is that I was hyper-critical of myself. I was conditioned to be hyper self-critical by my parents since I was a kid. I had a pattern of "beating myself up" over the past. I wanted to change this from unhealthy hyper self-critical to healthy reflection. Rather than beating myself up, I began to get curious. Rather than think "I shouldn't have said that to my gf yesterday. I bet I hurt her feelings. I'm such a bad person". . . I would think "Isn't it interesting how I responded to my gf yesterday. What was the underlying energy? Was I insecure? I wonder how my response impacted her. Perhaps she wasn't hurt. Perhaps I can ask her. This would be a good way for us to connect. Then I can learn how to respond in a healthier way in the future". . . I would spend some time journaling. Yet the energetics are important. Rather than beat myself up, I was more of an observer that is curious about myself. Here I didn't make harsh self judgments or harsh self-criticism. 

This growth didn't happen overnight. It took time to re-condition my mind. Yet the time and effort is sooo worth it. I now have a healthy amount of time engaged in the past and rarely enter hyper-self critical spaces of beating myself up. I'd say only about 10min. each day are in this space. As well, I am much better at recognizing it and learned how to diffuse the intensity. 

You might also want to consider therapy to help release patterns. For me it did not help to see a therapist that engaged in the OCD story. I found a psychologist specialized in releasing the pattern of intrusive thoughts. For me, EMDR therapy was helpful because it does not engage in the mental story. It goes prior to the mental stories in a effort to diffuse the triggers of the story. 

[ivankiss]

Been there, many times. 

Here's a few simple steps that usually help me snap out of it quickly;

1. Nothing is stupid.

2. If it could've happened differently it would have.

3. How is this helping me evolve?

4. Thank you.

[SoonHei]