Everything we fret about will one day be gone, but the effects will last generations.

I wrote this here:

"A quick story: My Grandpa Grandy (LaVerne E Grandy) remembers going to the cemetery with his father. Grandpa’s father looked at his father’s grave and said, “I hated that man.” Grandpa was very young when that happened, and we don’t know to this day why my great grandpa would say that about his own father in front of his son."

We often obsess over singular events, actions, words in our lives. We'll see or do something we later regret, and collect and organize these incidents so we can examine them later and relive the guilt.

Consciously or not, we all do this. Some of it is necessary for a healthy society (if we can't feel guilt, we are pathological), but that necessary ability can become a debilitating neurosis.

Consider the remains beneath all these headstones. All the unrecorded mistakes and regrets are gone forever with the last person that remembers them.

That much is comforting. But the cumulative effects linger, good or bad, happy or unhappy. Our attitudes and actions become part of the behavioral DNA of those we affected most, who then pass it on to others.

This isn't a spiritual or karma thing (though it can be seen that way). It's cause and effect.

Some folks are strong enough to return pain with patience and stop a cycle of abuse. I think my Grandpa Grandy's dad was that kind of man. Just my speculation, but anyone who could at once curse his own father and raise a sweet, gentle man like my grandfather must have had this ability.

Started: 2012-06-14