[wolfgang]

Originally Posted by Ilya

Yes, having a loss brings up memories. But they are not necessary bad memories. Time heals all wounds. Sooner or later the bad things fade and the good things stay. It's when this doesn't happen and the negative memory takes the life of its own, we usually talk about the psychological problem. And all XXth century psychology is about being able to do something about it.

Time, ok. And it's better to have loved and lost because you know you can love. But to have ot taken and not here hurts. Is it better to hurt for a love that's gone, then to not have loved? I guess if the hurt feelings resolve or lessen and the love that was can be remember for being a cool thing in the past - then it's better. But first one has to go through those feelings of not having love that felt great in the past.

The common consensus among most schools of psychology is that we need to "relive" the traumatic moment to let it go. The ways of how to do it is where the branches of psychology differ.

Creating a bridge to the topic about crying, once we clearly put something in the past, it has no power over us. But if we remember the painful moment ad if it is happening here and now (which it doesn't), it will cause us pain.

Clearly putting something in the past also is a trigger for sadness. To actually stop denying the love is gone is sad. So maybe to feel the hurt over lost love is also an expression of putting the memory in the past - an acknowledgement of framing the memory.

The funny thing is that you can take positive stuff and literally make it cover the negative. But that's some mental magic.

hmmm... The positive should outshine the negative. The negative is that the positive is no longer here. The positive is in the past but negative only because the positive is gone. It's a positive memory with a negative in the now, since it's gone.

Maybe it's just time that fixes lost love memories along with actually feeling the lost so as to acknowledge that it's a memory only.