Did You Know – Joyful Memories Can Be a Source of Pain?

This article has been researched and written by Yassine Tayie. AI has not been used in producing this article.

I can’t count the number of clients who tell me: “Why does my brain only bring back negative thoughts?” – let’s explore the opposite route this time. We tend to think in terms of positive and negative, yet therapy — or life — often teaches the opposite. In clinical work, especially around relationships and break-ups, what triggers distress is not always the painful moments, the conflicts, or what caused the separation. Those elements are often kept at a safe distance because they are too distressing. What remains accessible instead is the positive material — detached from its context, isolated from the rest of the narrative — and this is what becomes the trigger.

You think about the last trip you took together. This memory should, in theory, make you feel good. Yet you’re surprised to see that it’s followed by discomfort, sadness, or disturbance. What is also present is the information of a lost access to that positive experience. The memory remains unprocessed, and the mind tries to understand how this happened.

Information is not stored chronologically, but associatively. The mind and body link experiences they believe to be similar. A present disturbance can therefore connect to earlier experiences — for example, childhood moments where being “ wrong ” meant being left alone.

When faced with a relational rupture, the mind seeks quick coherence: “There is something wrong with me, ” “I can’t keep relationships, ” “I always come second.” Avoidance strategies to maintain the coherence often follow: avoiding dating, social gatherings, or certain places.

Yet the break-up itself remains unprocessed. Clinically, we often observe that what causes distress is not only the loss, but the idea that it was perfect before. The mind may then operate through cleavage — isolating good and bad, black and white.

This mechanism is well known in early attachment and appears clearly in situations of emprise or domestic violence: “They are bad only when they drink, ” yet “loving and caring when they don’t. ” In this configuration, positive memories can become powerful triggers, or serve as a psychological grip.

Thinking of joyful moments brings sadness because the negative material remains at a safe distance.

The same logic appears in thoughts such as: “If this had never happened, ” “If I had different parents, ” “If I hadn’t met this person.” The information stays frozen, not integrated into the broader narrative.

In EMDR, this is precisely what is targeted: experiences that remain isolated and unprocessed. What makes an event distressing is not whether it is “ positive ” or “ negative, ” but how it has been experienced and integrated. In some cases, even a positive memory can be worked on to reduce disturbance.

Why do these memories keep coming back, or why there is a need to look up for them ?

Well, what repeats itself is not what was met, but what was missed. A helpful metaphor is that of a video game: we rarely replay the levels we succeeded at. We replay the ones we failed, in an attempt to make sense of them. In break-ups, joyful memories are often brought back not to relive them, but to understand the loss.

The mind is not revisiting the moment to relive happiness, or sadness, but to understand what no longer exists and why. From this perspective, suffering is often less about the event itself than about the meaning attributed to it — a meaning shaped by earlier experiences.

If you recognise yourself in this pattern, EMDR therapy offers a way to process what remains unintegrated and move forward with greater emotional clarity. Reach out to us to learn how we can help.

Yassine Tayie

Clinical Psychologist