Robyn Gruber 
Licensed Professional Counselor

When events happen to us that contradict our personal values and beliefs about the way our life should have been, we experience a variety of negative emotions. The chemical responses triggered in our brains by our emotions determines how these memories are stored in our brains. When issues are not resolved in a short period of time, those disturbing events are recorded in our brains as ongoing situations. In other words, after days, months or even years have passed, our brains do not recall the incident as something that occurred in the past. It is as if it is still happening.

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When your brain perceives that a situation is still happening that is dangerous to you physically or emotionally, it will implement strategies aimed at keeping you safe. Initially, these responses make sense and are helpful, but over time, they become counter-productive and keep us from moving on to live the kind of life we desire. We simply get stuck, and even though we try to convince ourselves that what we're doing and thinking no longer makes sense, we still can't move on because our brains have not been informed that the danger is over.

 

 

When that happens, moving on with your life seems impossible. Your ways of surviving have become who you are, your identity, and although you desperately want to change, the progress you make is always temporary and difficult to sustain. If that's true, the situation is bleak and we will struggle to overcome the past forever.

 

 

And that's where many people find themselves. Always struggling. Always surviving. But it doesn't have to be that way! Once our brain gets the message that the events of yesterday are in the past, and not ongoing events to protect you from, resolution takes place and you are able to put the past behind you and move on.

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