In en earlier blog, we looked at why we worry about the future, and what we can do about it.
In this blog, let us look in the opposite direction - the past! It is not only the future that torments us, but the past does an even better job, with painful memories, hurt feelings, and real outcomes. Compared to the fears of the future, which are imagined and have not happened yet, the past is real, because it has happened and we have lived it.
Let’s be honest - we have had our good days and bad days. But what is striking is that we remember the bad days more than the good days. Hurt feels real and large, but joys are dim and distant. Why do we feel this way? When it comes to remembering the past, why does pain feel disproportionately larger than pleasure?
Emotional experiences, particularly those involving fear or pain, are more likely to be remembered vividly because they trigger stronger emotional arousal. This heightened arousal enhances memory consolidation, making these experiences more durable and accessible in memory. Also, humans tend to have a negativity bias, where negative experiences, such as pain, are given more attention and weight than positive ones. This bias can lead to negative memories being more easily recalled and remembered over time
More importantly, as we discussed in the previous article, from an evolutionary perspective, remembering pain can serve as a protective mechanism. It helps individuals avoid similar harmful situations in the future, which is crucial for survival. This adaptive function may contribute to why painful experiences are more memorable.
Both pain and pleasure involve overlapping brain regions, but pain often activates additional areas related to fear and avoidance. This complex neural processing can make pain more memorable by associating it with fear and avoidance behavior
So, next time you are ruminating the past, remember that it is because you are wired to do so.
The problem with such rumination is that it robs us of the present. The beautiful day, the smiling people around us, the birds chirping, the beautiful music playing - all these can be drowned out by the ruminations, leaving us with a feeling of not living the life that we deserve.
This is unfortunate, and can have real consequences beyond not just living in the present. If we cannot focus on the things that we are supposed to be doing, we can fail to achieve our goals and might even find ourselves in real trouble. We may fail the test at school, fail to graduate, spoil a relationship, perform poorly at work, or even lose interest in everything.
This is a tragedy, but the first step in addressing this is to remember that we go through this pain because we are wired to do so. Wired to prioritize past pain over pleasure. Evolutionarily trained to fear pain and therefore remembering pain more.
What can we do about this? Stay tuned for the next article.