Apparently, scientists may soon be able to erase fear and trauma from patients' minds. The technology is meant to help people cure phobias such as a fear of spiders, but my mind immediately turned to wiping out of the pain of failed relationships, 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'-style.
After one particular ex-boyfriend left me broken, I literally longed for a mind-erasing device, and have asked myself many times if I would take a pill that would have allowed me to forget the pain. At the time when I was drowning in pints of Ben and Jerry's and self pity, I would have taken it without question. But now, I think that the pain has made me stronger - and without it, I would have kept going back to the same bad relationship patterns (and probably the same guy!) over and over again.
With some perspective, I think that our bad experiences (and bad break-ups) make us who we are, and would not want to forget a single second of my life. The pain happens for a reason; so that hopefully, we learn and don't keep making the same bad choices. As for confronting phobias, surely that should be done by facing fears head-on instead of messing with people's memory?
Sign me up. I know it's swish to say "I have no regrets" but I've got a stack. You can reach a passive kind of truce with things but active endorphins take a hit. It might "make us who we are" but gimme "who we might be" any time!
Posted by: UrbanOspreys | Thursday, 23 October 2008 at 07:55 PM
I'm going through a bad break up at the moment and I would definitely take a pill if it did something similar to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
Posted by: Harriet | Friday, 24 October 2008 at 09:03 AM
Why can't we just deal with our problems by facing them? Society's growing desire to find the easy way out is concerning. Life can be horrible at times and how we deal with the more difficult challenges is what defines us.
Having memories wiped from your brain is not all it may seem - I speak from experience having been treated in the States with 'shock therapy' - I've lost the majority of my memories for most of a 2 year period. Of course a lot of those memories were not pleasant as I was deeply depressed at the time - but there were good one's too and they are lost just the same.
Let's not play God.
Posted by: g | Friday, 24 October 2008 at 10:54 AM
Rushing away.
In the light
of a new song
I like the
perception of
a sweet sensibility,
the height of
the season and
a burning desire.
Francesco Sinibaldi
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