Is Your Past Holding You Back?

I could just see the look of fatigue on her face when McKenzie came to our counseling appointment that day. Her tired eyes were framed by her polite, yet depleted smile. She felt empty and didn’t know where to begin. She felt discontent and didn’t know how to get her joy back. She had been giving, and giving, and giving, caring for everything and everyone around her – her ailing parents, her struggling brother, her lonely family members – but now she felt like had nothing left to give.

She was struggling with burnout, overwhelm, and depression. Her life felt stressful at every turn from her job, to her family, to her ministry.

I asked her to tell me when she had fallen into the “caregiver role”, she replied, “I guess I’ve been this way my whole life – probably ever since I was a little girl. As the oldest of five, with parents who divorced, I’ve just learned to take care of everyone else…but I don’t think I ever learned how to care for myself.”

With those words, McKenzie had just taken a few steps forward without even realizing it. Because she had started making connections that would lead us to confront the insecurity, pain, and rejection from her past that were still holding her back right here and right now.

GOING BACK TO GO FORWARD

I don’t believe that most people have a proper understanding of how much our past influences our present. So much of how we do life in the present, is impacted by the way we experienced life in the past.

Who you were then, impacts who you are today. What you experienced then, influences who you are today. The way you interacted with your parents, your friends, and your family; your childhood personality, experiences, and memories – for good and for bad – have all come together to shape you into the person you have become.

The story of your past shapes the story of your present. Many of our stories come with joy, fond memories and positive experiences. But other stories are laced with rejection, abandonment, fear, abuse, addictions and more. But no matter what story we come from, if we’re not aware of the past, and how it’s shaped us, just like McKenzie we’ll find ourselves stuck in some of those very same patterns again, and again, and again.

BACK-TRACKING

If you ever book a counseling session with me, you should know that we’re going to spend a lot of time talking about the past. In fact, one of the first things I have you do during our time together is to write out a timeline for me of significant events, starting from your earliest memories, and noting the experiences that have shaped you for both good and bad all the way to today.

Why don’t you join in on this process with me? Let’s just pretend we’re in a counseling session together right now. Go ahead and grab your laptop, a journal, or a piece of paper and a pen, and write out your own timeline. Think through the experiences that have really impacted you, or even changed the course of your life from childhood until today. Think of the significant highs and lows in your life that have influenced who you are today.

Maybe you dealt with some childhood anxieties. Maybe you experienced the pain of watching your parents go through a difficult divorce. What about the day you came to know Jesus, that incredible life-changing experience at summer church camp, or some bad friendships you endured in high school? It could have been anything from dealing with difficult parents, to attending a new church, to failing your college entrance exams. It could have been the death of a loved one, or even the death of a dream. Maybe it was the sting of a toxic relationship, experiences in your marriage, or dealing with infertility.

There are so many things that shape your life, moving you to become the person you are today. Take some time to think through all of those things and jot them down in the form of a timeline starting with your earliest significant memories. To make it easier to visualize, I find it helpful to draw a line going up for the positive experiences along the timeline, and a line going down for the harmful ones. If you were my client, this is the timeline we’d begin with in our first session together, talking through each significant event, making connections, and extracting the impact and meaning it’s had on your life and development. Because whether or not you want to believe it, each portion matters.

Every now and again, I’ll get a client who would rather not go there.

“What does the past have to do with what I’m going through today?” they’ll question.

“Everything”, I’ll respond.

The average person doesn’t truly understand how significant their past is in shaping their emotional health. But I truly believe that the majority of the issues we’re facing in the present, have their roots in the experiences of our past. When we focus too much on the present, without ever looking at the past, we’re like a gardener who is pulling the tops of the weeds without getting to the root. It’s only going to give us short term relief. Those weeds are going to keep coming back, until we can get to the bottom of them.

In Philippians 3:13, Paul reminds us of the importance of “forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead”. Our problem as human beings is that we can’t simply “forget” unless we first acknowledge, understand, and learn from our past. In order for the past to lose its power over us, we have to go back before we can move forward. We have to deal with the past, in order to be freed from the past.

FACING VS. FIXATING

Too often, we get stuck because instead of facing the past– we fixate on the past. We ruminate, and dwell, and obsess on the things we should have done, or would have done, or could have done differently if we had another chance.

Facing your past is not the same as fixating on your past… the first moves you forward, the second keeps you stuck.

One moves us to understand how our past has shaped us and pushes us to find freedom in God’s truth – the other keeps us paralyzed in shame and regret.

One is intentionally looking back in order to heal, the other becomes obsessive rumination and causes more hurt and pain.

My question to you is this: have you ever taken the time to face your past, or have you just fixated on your past?

The answer to this question changes everything. Because going backward might be the very thing you need to do in order to move forward.

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Take the next step: If there are things in your past that are keeping you stuck, consider booking a session with a counselor from the Debra Fileta Counselors Network. Using foundational principles from God’s Word, as well as life-changing methods from counseling and psychology, her team is dedicated to help you get unstuck in any personal or relational issue you might be facing. Learn more or book a Session Today!

Debra Fileta

Debra Fileta is a woman deeply in love with Jesus, a passion that drives her as a wife, mother, licensed professional counselor, speaker, and author. She and her husband John, along with their four children, live in Lancaster, PA. Specializing in dating, marriage, and mental health, Debra is the author of several books, including True Love Dates, Choosing Marriage, Are You Really OK?, and RESET. She hosts the Love + Relationships Podcast and runs TrueLoveDates.com, a blog reaching millions with the message of healthy relationships. Debra is also the founder of the Debra Fileta Counselors Network.