Old memories can be hard, and rumination can be so debilitating. The best way I can find to stop them is to distract from them
is.
I find something to watch or listen to that makes me laugh.
Old movie comedies are great for this.
The American night talk shows hosts if you are centre to left leaning politics. They are funny. I follow them and watch them on Tik Tok mostly. Josh Johnson is very funny also -he was on Saturday night live for a while. I often plug in with earphones. There’s lots others of others but I’m having a mental block at the moment.
A little more serious thing I do is to look for books and movies mostly (but not all) about women, and mostly written by women. At the end of any good movie or book, the main character will have struggled somehow, and should have had a lightbulb moment and be transformed in some way. It helps to remind me, once again, I’m not stuck so much as it’s my thinking that is stuck. Books and movies often give me new perspective. Also TV series like ‘Better Things’ (American) and Motherhood (English) . There’s a funny Australian one about new mums called The Letdown. And they are good no matter what age or stage of life you are at, imo.
I’m a bit weird I think, but good horror movies and tv series take me out of myself. movies like Sinners that have a political message - and a lot of dancing and music is a great watch . It’s a horror movie but it’s one of the best I’ve seen, with a strong social
messages and it made me think - it taught me something that has changed me and reinforced things I already knew.
I’ve been feeling down lately, as caring for a very sick husband has tied me to the house for about 8 months now. I’ve been doing things like the listening to music to lift my spirit while doing chores and caring for him.
One thing I usually do when feeling down and dispirited is put music on. I have a playlist of up songs I love listening to from various decades which I clean the house to, and dance around to Dancing - just moving my feet to the futon makes me feel better. And it gets me through the really boring of hard chores too. I’ve just started looking on Tik Tok for a dance routine to start to learning. An easy one LOL. Some days it can be hard to motivate myself to just turn on the music but it’s always a pleasure when I do.
Good luck OP. And the previous poster was right ‘this too shall pass.’ One more thing , we can’t predict the future but I’ve found that there are moments in life that are very very good and surprise us. We never know when they are going to happen but I treasure them when they happen. And I try to remember that another moment will happen sooner or later.
AND I hesitated to mention it 😂 but Sex is a great distraction and very rewarding. Sex with oneself is fun. It feels great. Sex, music, food. 😂
I don’t know if this is helpful or just useless rambling but it’s serving as a reminder to me that life isn’t as shit as it felt when I woke up this morning. So hopefully it helps you in some way.