Productive Forgetting: Part 4

This is the final blog on Productive Forgetting. To re-cap a bit..... Productive Forgetting is the ability to abandon unproductive ideas and temporarily put aside stubborn problems until new approaches can be considered. I have previously shared my thoughts on how this concept affects my outside world in recovery with containment and denial. My internal world is also affected.

I believe all of my parts work to help the entire system. They do not always have the most current information but they all are attempting to help me in some way. (See www.selfleadership.org for more information on parts.) I think MANY of my parts have known about Productive Forgetting FOREVER. (It makes me wonder if the person who "invented" this term had several parts of his / her own!)

My system at times works very hard and succeeds to keep information from me. I have lost time and will find things I've done which I do not recall. I believe specific parts work to keep this information from me because they do not think I have the skills yet to comprehend what happened. At times I get frustrated when I can't remember certain time frames but I appreciate the care of my parts.

I have parts that "fog" certain memories or ideas so I can only glimpse pieces of them. I have some parts that lock information away so I do not have access to it at all. These protectors feed me only the information they believe I can handle at the time.

I ALSO have parts I WISH I could forget. I wish there was a way to forget the rapes entirely. However, I realize I HAVE done that in the past and found it was not "productive" forgetting. It eventually became unproductive as I had flashbacks and a life threatening eating disorder while suppressing or avoiding these memories.

The crux of the definition of Productive Forgetting is "until new approaches can be considered." I have new approaches and all my parts or memories are welcome. Together we can productively forget as well as productively remember. I am thankful for the work of Richard Schwartz who created IFS. It is through this modality I have been able to safely deal with all my memories and parts. Without IFS, I would not have these new skills to work with the previously forgotten or avoided problems.

Feel free to comment: Do you have parts or memories that have been "Unproductively" Forgotten? Do you think IFS part work could help you deal with them safely?