How To Forget

Don't turn off the lights. Imagination runs more wild in the dark. When the lights go out, the memories flood in, and if you let that happen you won't ever escape them.

Don't close your eyes. Same principle. If you allow yourself to sleep, the nightmares will wake you up anyway. It may seem impossible but all it takes is focus. Focus on a tiny sound- the ticking of a clock or the whirring of an air vent. Concentrate on it as if losing your concentration means the end, because sometimes it does.

Avoid people, places, music, everything that reminds you. Sometimes everything does remind you. In that case, you simply have to become a recluse and take up knitting while you watch reruns of Star Trek and eat whatever happens to be in the pantry. It'll keep your mind off it.

Don't talk about it. Talking will only make you remember. Push it to the back of your mind and build walls of fake laughter and forced smiles around it. And if all these things fail and you still can't forget, you'll just have to find something else to break your heart instead. 

These methods work. Usually. The problem is that if you do this trying to forget the past, you'll forget yourself and end up losing the present as well. 

You never really forget. Even if you don't let yourself think about it again for the rest of your life, deep down inside you still remember, and there's nothing you can do to change that. The only way to forget is to realize that you can't.