REFERERENCES
How often , in your mind, do you consciously make references to the past?
It may be more frequent than you think.
Do you ever dream of yesterday's events while sleeping? You probably do far less of that sort of thing when day-dreaming, but, even then, we tend to sort back to see how we handled a like situation years ago.
I know I have called on this dream pseudo-technique successfully. It's common pattern, I suppose. I have gone to sleep at night consciously aware of the fact that an item I need was lost, which I may have misplaced and I dreamed of its wayward location awakened and found the lost item. No doubt, you too, have had, too, have had such an experience as well.
It can be contended that we would have found the item eventually anyway. We would remember where we had put the item. Even then, you see, to recall the act of mis-placing the item is a reference to a past series of actions.
We must the caution at the same time.
Our past is filled with errors, mistakes, and mis-judgments. of course, or we would not be in the plights of the present period. I fact, that may be the most valuable thing we learn from a study of the past – how we did things the wrong way and can avoid doing some of them, all over again.
We need to study the past. Years ago the subject “History” was?lumped together as a mish-mash shoveled out in robotic regularity. We need
to refer to the past to improve out present and future well-being.
A.L.M. November 17, 2003 [c-285wds]
