‘Remember to forget mindfully.’

What did we learn today on this first Monday of this glorious new year?

A hooded 4-year old boy scrambles under a fence on a chilly winter's day

Here’s a few items, in no particular coherence or narrative buildup.

There’s two types of people: people who leave on time, and people who think they’re going to leave on time.

One hundred percent of the time I think I’m going to be in the first group, and ninety-eight percent of the time, I end up in the other.

But it’s never my fault. Here are a few things that got in the way of leaving on time today.

Somebody pooped in a diaper, which needed changing and then some poop from that diaper got on the floor; resulting in the need for multiple cleanups of different geographies and body parts.
Somebody else used a toilet for a similar purpose (see above), and needed help in the bathroom with some issues relating to that activity and getting certain portions of their anatomy clean and fresh afterwards.

Go get in the car! I ordered the two-year old as I went to make myself a quick cup of coffee for the road. I did so, quickly, because I’m quick,

and took my coffee mug to the front door, throwing it open and ready for the open road, only to almost trip over a two-year old who had traveled a total distance of eighteen inches to the car since my directive five minutes before.

WHAT ARE YOU DOING? I said through gritted teeth as I scooped him up in one arm and divested half the contents of my hot coffee across my shirt and pants as we raced, quickly, toward the car.

I wait for you Daddy! He said happily as I leaped across the driveway and tossed him in the car seat, quickly.

Finally we were underway, and I don’t even know if we were on time or late because sometime you are just weary and want to forget what you might have failed at. And that’s one lesson I’d like to remember to remember:

Think carefully about what you’re okay forgetting. Some things are good to forget, so don’t waste time trying to remember everything.

I also got into a battle royale with our 2-year old over a banana. What was the issue? The issue was that he wanted a whole banana. Not a half banana. He wanted it whole and intact. Not broken up. Whole. How did this battle end up, and why did it become a battle, and why, you might be asking, could you, as the parent, have let such a small thing escalate to the level of battle?

And here, my friends, is a great opportunity for me to sit back with a smug smile and say I don’t know. I forget how it all happened and why it was a big deal, and I don’t remember how it ended up, but I’m pretty sure I won.

See, when you choose to forget, then you also choose to create your own post-experience narrative. The main difference between me and the current incarnation of a certain cult-like false-prophet fake patriot following American fundamentalist party is that I cheerfully and transparently acknowledge the self-deceit I play on myself (and others) in choosing to forget what I want.

But the fact is, here’s the thing:

Reality exists. You can forget or ignore all you want, but the reality still exists, and somewhere amidst the reality is a truth made up of facts.

I’d like to be the hero in all my stories, and maybe in some other people’s stories too on occasion.
I’d like to erase my failures from today and yesterday.
I’d like re-dos on various parts of every day.
I don’t want to think about what I didn’t do well. Or what I just plain failed at.

There is a continuum between Everyday Survival and Holding Yourself Accountable that every person has to face.

Out of survival, we’ve gotta move forward and forget some things so we can focus on the present and future.
Out of growth, we’ve gotta move forward by reflectively owning up to what we didn’t do well in the past, examining what could be done better, and then choosing to improve and evolve.

How do you find your spot on the continuum? I don’t know. I think effectively finding that spot is called Wisdom, and I’m still figuring it out. I think caring enough about your mistakes to own up to them and try to improve is called Honesty, and I’m probably a little further along with that one.

We live in a time in which people want to re-create a reality that already happened. Not simply remember differently, not simply re-interpret a happening, but actually recreate it as a historical event in the manner they’d like it remembered.

We have to fight that. We all do it. I do it. We’re the nucleus of our own story and the star of our own stage and we don’t want to rip down the idea that we’re heroic. Sometimes we are.

Sometimes we’re not. And we should have the courage to face the times when we’re not and not retroactively remake reality as something it wasn’t.

We can reflect.
We can remember.
We can interpret, as I often do with hyperbole, exaggeration, and fixation on side-details that may not seem important or even relevant to others.

But I want to keep some sort of grip on reality; a reality that has a baseline in our willingness to use wisdom in choosing what to remember and in choosing what to forget and in differentiating between the two.