How to Change Your Past

You cannot rewrite what happened—but you can question what it means about you.

Your past is over. What you have right now is your thinking about it.

That distinction changed my life. I used to spend so much time explaining my present by what had happened before. I thought my past had already decided who I was and what was available to me.

But the story I tell about my past is a story I am telling now. And I can change that story without changing a single thing that happened.

The story and the facts are different

When I ask you about your childhood, you tell me your version of it. Your parents may have a different version. Your siblings may remember things you don't, or disagree with your memory entirely.

There are the things that happened. Then there is what you made them mean about yourself and your life.

The feelings you have as you tell that story are feelings you are experiencing in the present. You aren't feeling the exact emotion you felt when you were three. You are thinking about an experience now and creating a feeling now.

This is why your current thinking matters so much. The way you describe your past affects how you feel, how you act, and what you create next.

Which story are you telling?

I do an exercise where I describe two people. One had a terrible life. The other had a wonderful life. I ask the audience what kind of future they imagine for each person.

Then I show them that I have described the same person.

In one version, I select everything that supports a horrible life. In the other, I select everything that supports a wonderful life. The life hasn't changed. The focus has.

You can do this with your own history. If I ask you to make a case for a wonderful life, you can find wonderful experiences. If I ask you to make a case for a horrible life, you can find painful ones.

Notice which case you are making, and what that story creates for you. Are you using your past to explain why you cannot move forward? Or are you using it as evidence of your strength?

How I changed my story about my parents

My father was an alcoholic and was very unavailable. My mother was depressed and struggled to care for us deliberately. As a child, I struggled to find my identity.

I could focus on how they should have been different. My dad should have stopped drinking. My mom should have gotten her act together. They should have taken better care of me.

When I thought that way, I felt angry, frustrated, and upset.

But I could also see how that experience required me to become independent. I had to ask questions about myself. I had to go searching. That search helped prepare me for the life and work I have now.

My dad died of cirrhosis when I was young. When I think about him, I choose to remember how funny he was, the things he said, and the ways he was kind. I can see a person who was suffering, trying to find his way, and making mistakes.

I feel love for him. I don't have to think of myself as his victim.

With my mother, I choose to believe she was doing the best she could. My relationship with her shaped my relationship with myself in ways I might never have developed without the struggle.

Those thoughts set me free. The facts of my childhood haven't changed. What I make them mean has.

Making peace with what already happened

One thought I use about my past is that it was always going to happen that way.

I am not saying my future is predetermined. I don't think about my future that way. My future contains choices.

I think about my past that way because it has already happened. I cannot go back and make it happen differently. Arguing that I should have said something else or that someone should have behaved differently never changes it.

Byron Katie's work helped me understand how much energy I was spending arguing with what was already over. Making peace with it lets me decide what I want to do now.

That thought may not work for you. Find one that does. How do you want to feel about your past? How do you want to use it to become stronger, more capable, and happier?

Take what you want and leave the rest

I love Dan Sullivan's idea that you can take what you want from your past and leave the rest.

I use my past as strength. I think about my grandfather, who built a business from poverty and took it public. I love thinking that his blood runs through my veins. I think about my father's humor and what I learned through my relationship with my mother.

These are the things I want to bring with me.

I also want to be clear about the scope of this work. Trauma and post-traumatic stress are outside what I am addressing here. There are therapies that can provide healing for those experiences. I am talking about the painful stories people bring to coaching and continue using to define their lives.

For that work, start by summing up your past in one sentence. What title do you want to give it? What do you want it to mean?

If you want to believe your past made you strong and capable, go looking for that evidence. Retell the story in a way that gives you strength instead of taking it away.

You may not be able to change what happened. You get to change what it means to you now.