In this episode, I talk about the importance of setting up the lens through which we want to look, as we look back to what we've accomplished and experienced. As 2019 is nearing its end, now is a perfect time to take stock of what the past year (and the past decade) has offered us. I also mention a few scientific research findings that support this type of mindful, intentional revisiting of our past.
Episode Summary:
In this episode, I talk about the importance of setting up the lens through which we want to look, as we look back to what we've accomplished and experienced. As 2019 is nearing its end, now is a perfect time to take stock of what the past year (and the past decade) has offered us. I also mention a few scientific research findings that support this type of mindful, intentional revisiting of our past.
Key Take-Aways:
[00:51] Now is the perfect time to look back and reflect
[02:57] Memory can be malleable
[04:51] Intentionally setting up the lens through which we look back
[08:40] Looking back at the past decade
[10:31] Science-based evidence
[11:00] Topic 1: re-writing your memories
[13:26] Topic 2: revisiting positive memories to improve mood
[15:54] Your turn to look back at your past year and decade
Additional Resource:
You can find the free PDF that I mention in the show by clicking on the link here. It has a set of prompts to help you with intentionally searching your memory bank for the good and the valuable of this past year (and decade).
Scientific papers mentioned in this episode:
Topic 1: re-writing your memories
The first article that I mentioned was published by Donna J. Bridge and Ken. A. Paller in 2012 in the Journal of Neuroscience, and is titled “Neural Correlates of Reactivation and Retrieval-Induced Distortion”. You can find it here: https://www.jneurosci.org/content/32/35/12144. And a less confusing blog article on the concept, if all the science jargon kind of throws you off: https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2012/09/your-memory-is-like-the-telephone-game. Actually, they go into the potentially negative aspects of what implies, which I don’t discuss in this episode, in case you’re curious.
Topic 2: revisiting positive memories to improve mood
The original paper (as far as I could tell) on BMAC was written by Nicholas Tarrier in 2010, and it was titled “Broad Minded Affective Coping (BMAC): A “Positive” CBT Approach to Facilitating Positive Emotions”. You can find its abstract here: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2010-05471-007.
The studies that set out to test the efficacy of this method are:
1. Holden et al. (2017): “Emotional response to a therapeutic technique: The social Broad Minded Affective Coping”, which you can find at this link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/papt.12095
2. Johnson et al. (2013): “A Therapeutic Tool for Boosting Mood: The Broad-Minded Affective Coping Procedure (BMAC)”, which you can find here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235709020_A_Therapeutic_Tool_for_Boosting_Mood_The_Broad-Minded_Affective_Coping_Procedure_BMAC
3. Panagioti et al. (2012): “An empirical investigation of the effectiveness of the broad-minded affective coping procedure (BMAC) to boost mood among individuals with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)”, and the link to the abstract is here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005796712001052?via%3Dihub
Episode Transcript:
The transcript for this episode can be found at the-lightworkers-collective.com/002.
Share Your Wins!
I hope you enjoy this episode! You'll have to let me (and the whole collective!) know what some of these beautiful memories of your past year/decade are! Tag us on Instagram at @the.lightworkers.collective!
Much love,
Noémie
LadyNuage.com | @lady.nuage | fb.com/lady.nuage
Hi beautiful soul, and thank you for joining me for the next little while, while we embarked on an intentional journey backwards. Playing in the realm of time as we are right now, and in the midst of endings and new beginnings, choosing the so-called direction that our attention goes towards, is an incredibly powerful practice.
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As 2019 is coming to an end and we ready ourselves to welcome the 2020’s, now is the perfect time to look back and reflect.
To reflect on what we've done, and what we haven't.
To reflect on who we were, and who we are becoming.
To revisit memories that bring us joy, and offer forgiveness to those moments in which we were not fully aligned.
It's winter up here in the Northern Hemisphere, and the season of short days and cozy nights makes it easy to want to stay indoors and look inward. And this is what all invite you to do: to look inward, at the memories you hold this past year and this past decade. In many spirituality teachings, the Now moment is emphasized greatly, and over the course of the show will revisit this concept over and over again. But in this particular episode, let's make use of the linearity of time as we've experienced it so far to our advantage.
So what we'll do, is we will take a few moments or maybe more to aim our attention away from the now moment intentionally and consciously. And by that, what I mean is that we will do it with the intent to bring to our current state of being, rather than to take away from. We will bring clarity, wisdom, understanding, of what was, what transpired, what morphed, what became. Of you, or of your life.
I've actually created a short PDF to accompany this podcast episode, in which you'll see a few prompts to get your memory looking in the right spots, so to speak.
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Memory’s an interesting thing. There are actually a few metaphysical explanations to how it works that I find fascinating, and want to bring up in another episode of the podcast. For now, we'll keep it fairly simple. Memory is multifaceted. The recounting of your past experience ends up being this mixture of what was, what you saw and understood of what was, and what you stored in your memory bank, and what you subsequently pulled from your memory bank, mixed in with that added layer of context of the current moment.
So let's use an actual example of what I mean. Let's say you're having a conversation with a dear one, someone that is really close to you and they say: “Fine, I'll see you tomorrow.” And whatever the context around this “Fine, I'll see you tomorrow” will add layers of complexity to the message that you received. So when you store your memory, not only will you store that “Fine, I'll see you tomorrow”, but you'll store it with this added layer and colouring of your emotional state at that moment. And when you recall that memory later in the future-let's say you recall it while you're having an argument with this person-, it is likely that there will be an added layer colouring that recall. And that will be your emotional state while you're having the argument. Whereas if you are having a chat and you're in a state of joy and laughter, when you recall that “Fine, I'll see you tomorrow”, you'll probably recall it through a different emotional state. So what ends up happening is that not only did something happen, but we felt a certain way about it then, and when we talk about it, we feel a certain way about it in the present moment.
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So what we're going to do in this exercise, is that we're going to keep that in mind: that not only did the past happen, but the past happened and it made us feel a certain way. But on top of it, we have the ability to feel a certain way right now when the past.
Now that's actually a fairly advanced technique, but I have no doubt that those are you listening to me right now are more than able to do what we're going to do, so what I've done as I mentioned before as I've created a little PDF to go with this episode, which is basically a set of prompts, conscious prompts, to help you look back at your past year and then if you want to move further, look at your past decade. Now I know that there are plenty and plenty of things out there right now, with regards to closing out the year, closing out the decade, and it's that time of year-that time of year when we do look inward. So the PDF is free, the prompt sheet is available to you, it is totally up to you if you even go check it out-no pressure.
The reason I've done it though, is because I think that it’s really important that we set up our current state, our current frame of reference, as we go backwards. So if you take nothing else from this episode, I hope that you take that: when you are to embark on an introspective and retrospective exercise, decide before you do that, how you want to feel. How you want to feel about it.
Do you want to hold resentment? Do you want to revisit your resentment, or are you more interested in looking at how resilient you actually were, and recognizing that in those hardships?
And when you're looking at a joyful moment, rather than having any sorts of judgments around that joy, how do you want to feel? Maybe you want to revisit that joy and be in that moment of giddiness, silliness, of whatever it is that you were feeling. And truly respect it and honour it, and expand upon it by reliving it and adding complexity, and adding vitality to it in the present moment.
So that's all I wanted to say today. Again, I'm keeping another episode very, very short. But I do think it's important to do this exercise.
To actually go in and do the work.
To spend some time and to sit with yourself, and to look at how amazing this past year was.
How blessed we were, how blessed we are, that for the past 12 months, these incredible souls have been our friends, our family members, or co-workers.
That for the past 12 months, we've had health, we've had freedom, we've had security, our basic needs have been met.
We get to look back and be grateful for how supported we are by the Universe, by our guides, by our ancestors.
We get to look back and we get to look back at all those moments when we weren't maybe very sure (or maybe we had an inkling), that it was a loved one that gave us a nudge from the other side.
That it was God speaking directly to us.
That serendipity was present in our lives, over and over again, and that we started to look and we started to notice.
And we realized we've been supported all along.
When we look back, we have the opportunity to rewrite our story. Not to dismiss all that has happened to us as humans. Because everything-every single thing-that has happened to us, has shaped us into the person we are today. So instead, to be grateful for the person we are today, for the person we have become, and for the person we are becoming.
And so we look back at 12 months, but it’s the end of the decade, so why not go further? Why not look back at who we were, as we were entering 2010?
It was some time ago now. Who we were in 2010, who we dreamed of becoming, what was possible and within reach then-let's take a look at that, and let's be grateful for that person. And let's give gratitude to ourselves all along the way for having supported that person that was us 10 years ago.
For having delivered on the dreams, on the wishes; for having listened; for having been our own friends, our own family members. For having found ways to take care of our own selves. Over the past 10 years, the one person, the one human that was with us 24/7 without doubt, was our own selves. It really was. And we get to be grateful for that!
Now for me, when I look back 10 years ago, a lot has transpired since. And I remember what I dreamed of, and I remember who I wanted to become, and what I wanted to accomplish. And I have to talk to that person 10 years ago and say: “Look, I've done it all! I've done it all for you! Look where I've gotten us!”
And it's a really, really beautiful thing to do, to revisit a certain chunk of time and to recognize that we've done a lot more than we thought we could. We have become way more than we thought ourselves capable of. We have gone on trips, we have gone on adventures; we have met people, made connections that seemed so far out of reach that we never dared dream them. And yet look at us-in retrospect we've done pretty good for ourselves.
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chime
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While I was prepping for the recording of this episode, I actually found a few scientific research papers that are really relevant to what we are discussing today.
I don’t want to bore you too much, so I’ll only briefly summarize what the findings are, but they’re linked in the show notes in case you want to nerd out.
Okay, so I’ll mention two topics that I find totally relevant, so hang on to your seats and be prepared to be *amazed* at how much science is finally catching up to proving some of the things we’ve known intuitively for so long!
So first, let’s talk about this concept of altering your own memory!
The first paper is on the concept that every time you recall a memory, you distort it a little bit. It’s been compared to the telephone game, which in case you’re not familiar with it, is a game where each person in a line whispers the message they received from the previous person whispering in their ear. By the end of the line, the message is often very distorted! I think that’s actually a fairly useful parallel, to describe what happens when we remember a memory, of a memory, of an experience. So the paper was published in 2012 in the Journal of Neuroscience, and the authors were able to demonstrate that the way the brain processes memories, when they’re retrieved (so when you revisit a memory in your mind), then the memory is “updated” with information related to your revisiting of that memory.
So that amplifies this concept that memory isn’t really static. That when you bring in your current experience of the memory, then that current experience gets stored along with the original memory.
And these findings are pretty cool, and basically why what we’re doing today is really powerful! Knowing that we can influence the stored memory with the added layer of this current moment’s revisiting of our memories, the power that is now in our hands! And that responsibility, that power, is to decide what kind of additional information we want to update our memory with. And I’m fairly sure that you’ll agree with me: probably things that are going to make us feel a whole lot better in the long run!
So in this paper, they actually also reference previous studies that have inferred that if you “reactivate” a recent memory (so basically, spend time revisiting that memory), it’s more likely to become a long-term memory. Again, that’s definitely something that we’ve heard before, but I always find it super cool when science backs up our ancestral wisdom.
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Okay, so onto the second topic! I’ll keep it even shorter, because I don’t want to lose you!
So actually I can’t believe I’d never heard of this until researching for this episode, because I find it just *so cool* that scientists are making people do things that spiritual teachers and mentors use as “basic” tools from their spiritual practices. And science is finding that *it works*, over and over again!!!
So, this therapeutic technique was first published in 2010 in the world of psychology, and it’s called “social Broad Minded Affective Coping” (or BMAC, because the whole title is such a mouthful!). And basically it’s a method that’s aimed at boosting a person’s mood, through the recalling of past positive memories.
I’m sure it’s much more nuanced and technical than I’m going to make it out to be, but I didn’t find access to the original paper in time for the recording, so I’m going off of limited information… Basically, this BMAC technique sounds like a guided visualization of a positive past memory, and the positive emotional states associated with it. And its aim ia to improve mood in the person reliving the happy memory. So it sounds very similar to some of the things that spiritual teachers talk about. And I think that that’s pretty darn cool!
Now I did get access to subsequent studies that all found the method to be useful in boosting mood. I’m actually not surprised, because I do use this method pretty often myself, when I’m working on my gratitude practice, and I always feel better after it. And I’m sure you probably have at least one parallel experience that you can pull from when you have felt better, when you’ve thought about a happy memory.
So I’m going to put the links to these scientific articles in the show notes as well, because I think that they might actually be good references in the future at some point.
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chime
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So with that, I'll leave you-and hopefully with a little bit of homework, if you're up for it! once again I've left a PDF on the show notes, so go ahead and grab that. It's just a set of prompts to help you look back and wire your brain to look for the positive and to look with a very intentional and conscious intent at the past 12 months, and if you so wish, at the past 10 years.
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And in closing, I want to thank you so much for spending all this time with me. Thank you. I value time very much, and I value yours very much as well. I hope that this was valuable to you. I really encourage you to actually go and do the thing! Yes, I am saying it again! (I may get a little bit bossy over the next few episodes, we’ll have to see!)
Go download the PDF, take 10 minutes-even if it's only 10 minutes-, take 10 minutes and set a timer, and if you don't want to get into journaling mode, at least get into listing mode. Just list a few things. And that will really be a beautiful snapshot of all of the magic in your life. I'm so sure that there's way more than you give yourself credit for-and I hope that these prompts will help you in finding all the magic that you’ve forgotten about.
Sending you so much love! Thank you so much again for pressing play today, and if you like the episode, please feel free to review it on iTunes! I would love it if when we type in “lightworker”, The Lightworkers Collective actually showed up! So if you have something really good to say, or something constructive to say, feel free to say it to me! You can find us on Instagram at @the.lightworkers.collective. It's the same on Facebook. Otherwise, you can always find me I'm noemie@ladynuage.com if you want to email me, or the handle on both Instagram and Facebook is @lady.nuage.
I am wishing you a beautiful day, wherever you are! Much love to you.