seeing yourself in the past and wondering what you were thinking

[Reluctantly]

Have you ever found yourself able to look at what you were like as a child or just remembering some of it and wondering what exactly you were thinking at certain times and feeling kind of stupid for it? It's really weird for me to do this. It's almost as if everything is an experiment, even personality itself, and in order to establish how things are, a child has to act naively and do immature things like decide one day they should take something someone has, only to find out how much it hurt them, and then regret it; or curse and yell at someone just to see what people will do about, testing aggression perhaps. I always feel when kids throw tantrums in a store and won't stop it's because the parent hasn't produced the right stimuli to get them to stop or allow them to feel it is regrettably silly or stupid to act that way; but I guess that would be another topic.

So I guess I'm curious what anyone has to say about this if they want to talk about it personally.

 

[Smooch]

yeah.....I try not to remember my childhood for that reason.

 

[pjoa09]

I would wish to live all my years again keeping in mind what I have experienced already. That whole tantrum and hurting other people stuff is something I can't relate. But I would've used my time more productively.

 

[Vecho]

Even though I am only 17 I'd like to go back to where my personality, likes and dislikes came from. All the information that could be achieved from your self...

 

[Reluctantly]

yeah.....I try not to remember my childhood for that reason.

Ever find that your dreams sometimes force you too anyway?

I would wish to live all my years again keeping in mind what I have experienced already. That whole tantrum and hurting other people stuff is something I can't relate. But I would've used my time more productively.

Yeah, it's not so much about hurting someone as it is about experiencing and testing boundaries to 'find out' that you hurt someone by doing something and avoid it in the future. I was also just using that as an example, mostly. It can be anything that you learned from that in retrospect would make you feel ashamed or stupid and like you are watching another person, if you could 'rewatch yourself' from when you were younger.

Even though I am only 17 I'd like to go back to where my personality, likes and dislikes came from. All the information that could be achieved from your self...

I guess that's what makes video cameras so interesting. Sometimes you can view a tape and go back and see what you were like with vivid detail. It almost makes me regret not being a person that likes pictures and being taped.

 

[Ex-User (4771)]

Yeah one day i decided i was bored and it was a good idea to light my self on fire, so i dowsed my cloths in lighter fluid and had a five gallon bucket of water ready to put me out, sounds safe enough right? I mean i had the water there so its all good right? Oh how wrong i was was, when i lit up i guess the fluid seeped onto my skin and used it a fuel. I spent about 10seconds running around in circles when my brother hit me in the head with the bucket of water and threw it on me. No beans i was still in flames. I rolled around on the ground for another 5 or 6 seconds before i took the shirt off. Second/third degree burns to 20% of my body included my right nipple(which i was told was almost burnt off), under my armpit, and a small area on my back. A hospital visit and 4 weeks of putting 2 special burn ointments and wearing burn netting later i had completely healed up.

Every now and then I think back to that and say "WTF was i thinking?"

 

[xbox]

yeah.....I try not to remember my childhood for that reason.

lol same

 

[digital angel]

I wouldn't mind a do over button, sometimes. I think the process of growing up is important. A lot goes on.

 

[digital angel]

yeah.....I try not to remember my childhood for that reason.

lol. It's ok.

 

[cheese]

Yeah one day i decided i was bored and it was a good idea to light my self on fire, so i dowsed my cloths in lighter fluid and had a five gallon bucket of water ready to put me out, sounds safe enough right? I mean i had the water there so its all good right? Oh how wrong i was was, when i lit up i guess the fluid seeped onto my skin and used it a fuel. I spent about 10seconds running around in circles when my brother hit me in the head with the bucket of water and threw it on me. No beans i was still in flames. I rolled around on the ground for another 5 or 6 seconds before i took the shirt off. Second/third degree burns to 20% of my body included my right nipple(which i was told was almost burnt off), under my armpit, and a small area on my back. A hospital visit and 4 weeks of putting 2 special burn ointments and wearing burn netting later i had completely healed up.

Every now and then I think back to that and say "WTF was i thinking?"

I share your curiosity.

Should we take this seriously though? I recall an anecdote on this forum about going to a dance and in a bootylicious move biting his own tongue off, but it turned out to be fake (very disappointing).

 

[Bryson]

I've been thinking about that lately.
I look back and I see a guy that thought he was much smarter than he really was.
Yet I avoid acknowledging that the same thing will happen with the present me once i get older. It's tough man.

Nonetheless, we should keep in mind that everybody is wise after the fact. Ok, almost everybody.

 

[Infinite Regress]

When I was really young, I used to pretend I was asleep if my mum/dad/siblings came into my room and wanted to talk to me. I never understood why I did it, even though I didn't harbour any ill feelings towards them.

Very silly in hindsight, since I'm quite fond of my family.

 

[Vecho]

The worst part of remembering is that you see you have not changed even though somehow I think I've changed. Also seeing those events that built the personality I now have and what if I changed something what would have happened.
It looks like we have a non INTP self burning person....

 

[digital angel]

The worst part of remembering is that you see you have not changed even though somehow I think I've changed. Also seeing those events that built the personality I now have and what if I changed something what would have happened.
It looks like we have a non INTP self burning person....

Change or evolution happens. You probably have changed..probably in positive ways.

 

[Particle]

I mainly just recall the lack of information and understanding I had as a child. For instance, I was terrified of AIDS when I was about 10-13. First, I was scared of it because I knew it was a fatal disease that you couldn't even see. It could be lurking anywhere, just waiting to strike, right? I didn't like touching things other people touched for fear of getting it. Later on when they started teaching some rudimentary sex education in school (12ish), I thought that any sexual act had a corresponding chance of a person picking it up. Not just intercourse, mind you, but even masturbation. It was created out of nothing, basically, meaning that two people without the disease had an n% chance of contracting AIDS when they'd do it.

It's funny now of course, but when you're a child you just don't have all the information about how things work yet. It can lead to some odd fears and conclusions when viewed later in life.

 

[Dimensional Transition]

Yeah, it feels like the 'me' I am is completely different every 2 years.
I like remembering my past. It's fun to laugh at your old self and finally be cool with all those fears you once had. I would love to go back in time and talk to my younger self as some sort of older brother.

When I was really young, I used to pretend I was asleep if my mum/dad/siblings came into my room and wanted to talk to me. I never understood why I did it, even though I didn't harbour any ill feelings towards them.

Very silly in hindsight, since I'm quite fond of my family.

Haha! I also did this, and I have no clue why. My mom just wanted to kiss me goodnight, but I always pretended to be asleep.
I guess back then we just did what we thought was expected from us. Like when I was 6 I told my parents I didn't know who the American president was when they asked me out of curiosity, while I knew damn well it was Bill Clinton at the time. I semi-followed the news with them.

 

[Smooch]

Ever find that your dreams sometimes force you too anyway?

yes, why do you ask?

Does that happen to you?

edit: did you mean literal dreams or hopes/fantasies?

 

[Minuend]

Not really. I usually understand my reasoning for behaving in whatever way I did. I would say my tolerance for my behavior grows as I age. I was ok.

 

[ohrtonz]

whenever my mind is clear and nothing else is going on up there. things from the past pop in my head. somethings it feels surreal like a dream. examining how the situation could have been different. not really just what i could have said differently but the overall situation i suppose. its a weird feeling. it feels like regrets, depression for past events. even as little as me feeling bad i didnt say something to my friends gf in some normal small talk conversation. or why didnt i just say what was on my mind at the time.

sometimes when i wake up early on my own with clear thoughts and im in the shower.. i day dream all these past events, i stand in the shower forgetting what i was doing and it takes me longer to get ready. even though im feeling well slept and awake... i start feeling constant regret for everything.

 

[MissQuote]

A lot of the worse situations from my past I am able to look back on almost too objectively I think sometimes, I can see the humor in how silly I was and sort of examine it all as an interesting expierement I now have all the data from.

Most of the time I don't have to be upset in any way over anything that I have done or that has been done to me if I don't wish to be, and even when I choose to get upset over things I remember often it is just to see what it would feel like to be upset, to see what emotions I have that I can analyze about it all.

My husband gets freaked out over my "lack of remorse", or lack of a display of remorse, sometimes. He seems to think that if I do not "feel" bad that means I think I did nothing wrong, I wish he could see in my head to know that I see no use in emotionally ruminating in a negative way that affects the present when it makes more sense to me to know that I learned from a given situation and now am clear on how not to behave if a similar situation occurs in the future and to be, not necessarily cheerful, but satisfied over my new understanding of the way the world works.

I also wish though that it was easier for me to display remorse, because just because I don't properly display it doesn't mean it isn't there, just that the way I process it seems to be different than the way people prefer others to do so.

*edit- to put this in the context of the topic being about "when you were a child" my guy and I have know echother since we were young teenagers, so that is sort of what I was talking about.