Trauma isn't just a memory. It’s a physical glitch in the way your brain stores data. You’ve probably felt it—that sudden spike in heart rate when someone uses a specific tone of voice or the way a certain smell sends you spiraling back to a moment you thought you’d buried years ago. When we talk about getting past your past, we aren't just talking about "letting go" or "moving on." We are talking about the clinical framework established by Dr. Francine Shapiro in her seminal work on EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing).
It’s been years since the book Getting Past Your Past: Take Control of Your Life with Self-Help Techniques from EMDR Therapy hit the shelves. Yet, it remains the gold standard for anyone trying to understand why they overreact to minor inconveniences. Honestly, the brain is kind of a mess. It tries to protect us, but it often does so by locking us in a loop of outdated survival mechanisms.
The Science of Why You're Stuck
Most people think of memory like a filing cabinet. You experience something, you file it away, and you pull it out when you need it. That's not how it works. In the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model—the core theory behind getting past your past—memories of stressful events get "frozen" in their raw, unprocessed state.
They stay hot.
When a memory is stuck, it retains the original images, sounds, and, most importantly, the negative beliefs about yourself that occurred during the event. If you were humiliated in third grade, your adult brain might still be operating on the "I am powerless" or "I am stupid" software.
Dr. Shapiro's work suggests that these isn't just "personality quirks." They are symptoms of unprocessed physiological data. Your brain literally hasn't learned that the danger is over. This is why standard talk therapy sometimes feels like running in circles; you're talking to the logical prefrontal cortex, but the trauma is screaming from the limbic system.
What Getting Past Your Past Gets Right (And Where People Trip Up)
One of the biggest misconceptions about this approach is that it’s just about waving fingers in front of your eyes. That’s the "eye movement" part, sure. But the book focuses heavily on the "Touchstone Memory."
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A Touchstone Memory is the earliest experience that set the template for your current struggle. Say you have massive anxiety about work presentations. You might think the problem is your boss. In reality, the Touchstone might be a moment when you were five years old and your parents laughed at you for making a mistake.
The book provides self-help versions of EMDR tools, like the "Safe State" or "Calm Place" exercise. But here is the thing: you can't just think your way out of a physiological response.
The TICES Grid: A Real-World Diagnostic
Shapiro introduces a tool called TICES. It stands for:
- Trigger: What happened?
- Image: What do you see in your mind?
- Cognition: What is the negative thought? (e.g., "I am unlovable")
- Emotion: What do you feel? (Fear, anger, shame)
- Sensation: Where is it in your body? (Tight chest, hot face)
By breaking down a panic attack or an emotional outburst into these five categories, you start to distance yourself from the reaction. You become an observer. You realize, "Oh, I'm not actually dying; my body is just replaying a file from 1998."
The Controversy of "Self-Help" EMDR
Let's be real for a second. There is a lot of debate in the clinical community about whether you should even try these techniques without a therapist sitting across from you. EMDR is powerful. It can open doors that you might not be ready to walk through alone.
Dr. Shapiro was careful in her writing. She emphasizes that the book is meant to supplement therapy or help with "Small-t" traumas—the everyday slights and failures that build up over time. For "Large-T" trauma, like combat or severe abuse, doing this alone is like trying to perform surgery on yourself. It’s messy and potentially dangerous.
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The "Butterfly Hug" is a famous takeaway from the book. You cross your arms over your chest and tap your shoulders alternately. It’s a form of bilateral stimulation. Does it work? Yes. Is it a cure-all? No. It’s a regulator. It calms the nervous system enough so you can actually use your brain again.
Why We Misunderstand Moving On
Society loves the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" narrative. We are told to "get over it."
But the biology of getting past your past proves that "getting over it" is physically impossible if the memory is still stored in a high-arousal state. You aren't weak. Your hardware is just jammed.
Research published in The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry and various studies by the EMDR International Association (EMDRIA) have shown that bilateral stimulation helps the brain's two hemispheres communicate. This allows the "emotional" right brain to process the event through the "logical" left brain.
Think of it like a digestive system. When you eat something, your body takes the nutrients and gets rid of the waste. When you experience something, your brain is supposed to take the "lesson" and get rid of the "emotional charge." Trauma is basically emotional indigestion.
Actionable Steps for Processing Old Baggage
If you’re looking to actually apply the principles of the book without getting overwhelmed, you need a strategy that prioritizes safety over speed.
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1. Map Your Triggers
Stop ignoring the "small" things that irritate you. For three days, write down every time you feel a sudden shift in your mood. Don't analyze it yet. Just note the TICES: the trigger, the image, the thought, the emotion, and the physical sensation. You'll start to see patterns. You'll notice that the guy who cut you off in traffic isn't why you're mad; you're mad because you feel "invisible," which is a core negative cognition.
2. Build the "Calm Place"
This isn't just daydreaming. It’s a neurological grounding exercise. You need to identify a mental image of a place where you feel 100% safe. Focus on the sensory details. What do you smell? Is there a breeze? What color is the light? Once you have the image, use short sets of bilateral tapping (the Butterfly Hug) to "install" the feeling. Do this when you are already calm so that when you are stressed, the neural pathway is already paved.
3. Identify the "Negative Cognition"
Most of our pain comes from the labels we give ourselves. Common ones include "I am a failure," "I am not enough," or "I am in danger." When you feel a past memory bubbling up, ask yourself: "What does this memory make me believe about myself now?" That belief is the target. You want to move that belief toward a "Positive Cognition" like "I did the best I could" or "I am safe now."
4. Know When to Stop
If you start remembering things that make you feel like you're literally back in the moment (flashbacks) or if you feel completely numb (dissociation), stop. Your window of tolerance is closed. This is the boundary where self-help ends and professional clinical intervention must begin.
getting past your past is ultimately about integration. It’s about taking those fragmented, scary shards of memory and weaving them into the story of your life. They don't disappear, but they stop being the things that drive the car. You become the driver. The past just becomes the rearview mirror—useful for context, but not where you're looking to see where you're going.
The process is slow. It’s often frustrating. You’ll have days where you feel like you’ve conquered your demons and days where a specific song on the radio makes you want to hide under the covers. That’s normal. The goal isn't perfection; it's a nervous system that knows how to come back to center.
By using the tools of bilateral stimulation and cognitive reframing, you aren't changing what happened to you. You're changing how that history lives inside your body today. That is the only way to truly reclaim your future.