ghosts.

'Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.' (buddha)

this is what i learned and tried to apply all of last year. if anything it helped me to grapple with my sense of futility and lost causes. it had been an arduous journey towards healing but i think i have made it thus far because i refuse to let ghosts bother me, something i learned from the novel i'm teaching, wide sargasso sea.

i recall being really bad at handling especially information about my partner's past. be it my then husband to the person i'm now dating. i chanced upon a set of photos with his ex-gf and it sent me in a flurry of irrational insecurity. i nearly called off the wedding because at that moment all i could process from them was, damn, he looked so happy with her. perhaps i wasn't the one he really wanted to marry and settled for me. of course that was just my obvious self-image issues haunting me which i readily transferred onto him, even without giving him the credit or regard of trust and faithfulness.

and then cut years post-divorce and i was dating a girl whom was very much a down-to-earth creature. she wasn't even my-type to begin with but i think i let her adoration blind me to believing it was love. so you would think it wouldn't bother me if i knew anything about her past r/s. wrong. i trawled into her old blog entries one day and boom, i found myself once again feeling out of sorts. here was something about her past love and how devoted she was and there i was thinking maybe she still had residual feelings, leading me to call in the middle of lord of the rings, forcing her to emerge from the cinema baffled and i'd think annoyed. but she assured me and i guess after a couple of hours i worked it out as really something in my head, a voice distracting me from reason, a mindfuck if you will.

cut to present and i remember months ago chancing upon my present partner's old blog. i knew if i scrolled back just a little bit i'd uncover a pandora's box of things i didn't want to know or address. but as curiously foolish creatures we go see. and indeed for a good moment i felt uncomfortable, seeing how smitten and fond she was of someone else, the terms of endearment similar, the way she loved her familiar, the heart that i thought was connected to mine suddenly like a strangers. there again was everything i perceived for a moment because i allowed myself to focus on her past, not our present and promising future.

so i still maintain that much as our past is relevant and special in how it pieces our lives, forms us to who and what we've become, we ought to leave it there, much like we shouldn't examine the stitching on the attire once we've put it on, but relish in how it makes us look and feel, looking at the mirror ahead and its infinite possibilities of happiness, good memories, and loyalty. that to me is how you commit yourself. always forward. never looking back.