"The only time you should ever look back, is to see how far you've come"
I like that quote a lot... and I hope to encourage people to look back... with caution.
Looking back at the positives and the negatives is a nice way to reflect on changes, but there is a danger of drifting into a limbo type state where you revolve around these ideas, and sometimes they become justifications for our actions.
Obviously this happened to me (surprise, surprise). There is one thing I will never do on this blog, I will never ever describe in detail the causes. For many reasons, mainly because it's unfair, I wanted to avoid blaming specific events and people...it's simply not their fault. I chose to do the things I did, no one forced me to, but... I did occasionally point my finger and that got me nowhere- as expected.
I was forever looking back, I ignored the Present and the Future and lived in the Past. It was horrible. It made me not look forward to things, Christmas, Halloween, days out, waking up and specifically the end of this month.
Last year I was in LA... amazing right? eh... I struggle to see it as a positive... because I spent so much time condemning it. I know it was a great experience but I can't look at it like that yet, I guess it's selfish of me, go and do something that I probably won't do again and then complain about it (I regrettably got rid of most of the things I got from LA). I took the positives... corrupted and destroyed them physically and mentally, it made me a bitter person. I could take any sweet moment and just destroy it, it was a talent.
This probably isn't what you want to hear considering at the start I told you looking back can be a good thing- Nailed it!
Just bare with me.
There are specific things I look back on, college, LA, relationships and the way I was. It has helped form the person I am now. Looking back helped me sign up to Kilimanjaro, get into Uni, muster the courage to talk to someone I had silenced, and improve the way I see the world... it also eventually caused me to try and get a fashion sense. It was a time of reinvention, I looked back and saw how I was and am in the process of changing... evolving. It's a good thing because you're taking potentially negative forces and turning them into something useful.
I loved the way I was a year ago, I miss that version of "James", I miss the people he was surrounded by and the confidence he possessed, he was a very happy person. Then I changed and not for the better. I remind myself of the way I was regularly so I can compare and contrast... determine whether I'm on the right lines and at the moment I'm walking on a tight rope... slowly advancing forward but wobbling along they way (what to take from this... life is a giant tight rope). People change just like the seasons, slowly, and I think it's important to reflect on how you WERE and how you ARE now. You might not like what you find but maybe that's a good thing. I certainly didn't like it but I am who I am now because of it and because I chose to use it not bury it.
James Mark III is not perfect but he's stable...ish, Mark II broke down completely and Mark I... he is a relic of inspiration, gone but not forgotten... the goal is to make Mark IV (that's 4... right?) similar yet new. I'm a long way off, I can't say right now that I'm truly happy but I know I'm going to get there in the end.
It can be painful, there are things I wish I could forget... just remove it and put it in the bin; job done. Apparently the brain doesn't work like that, instead it seems like it has a vendetta and will surprise me with things I don't particularly want to think about. Despite the negatives, there are days where I am genuinely proud that I sat myself down and just thought about everything then there are days where I wished it would leave me alone, stop following me. There's a big difference between simply remembering and reflecting. I think the best way to define reflection in this case is taking a memory and using it, remembering is just sitting there indulging in the bad thoughts and doing nothing about it. Pain is part of a journey, its inevitable, crap, horrible but useful.
I've made it sound like out of all this... I've suddenly become a better person and that all this is easy. I can be a very cynical and nasty person when it suits me... doing charity work and writing a blog does not make me a saint nor does it erase the stuff I've done, that's staying with me. It's certainly not easy but I am beginning to like the person I am now, he doesn't seem too bad... still a nerd but I don't think that was going to change- I hope it never does.
Maybe change is good and looking back should be done when you've accomplished something great. It might be that I'm doing it all wrong but I know that thinking about people, things and events has caused me a lot of pain but has also given me the motivation to do something about it... it just took me 7 months to realize that. Don't wait. If something's pulling you down, use it. Make a suit of armor with it and fight back. We're human, there's nothing wrong with having bad days, bad weeks or even bad months... I still have them (too many if you ask me) but it's not all doom and gloom, it may feel like it but good things can and do happen and I hope everyone get's their fair share.
The reason I wrote this post is because I realized that I spend a lot of time... thinking, I judge my decisions and remember the things that I had tried to buried, sometimes it has a positive effect then other times it causes tears. I don't know why I do it... maybe its mental torture but I'd like to think it has made me a stronger person, not better... clearer and a tad tougher.
There are specific things I look back on, college, LA, relationships and the way I was. It has helped form the person I am now. Looking back helped me sign up to Kilimanjaro, get into Uni, muster the courage to talk to someone I had silenced, and improve the way I see the world... it also eventually caused me to try and get a fashion sense. It was a time of reinvention, I looked back and saw how I was and am in the process of changing... evolving. It's a good thing because you're taking potentially negative forces and turning them into something useful.
I loved the way I was a year ago, I miss that version of "James", I miss the people he was surrounded by and the confidence he possessed, he was a very happy person. Then I changed and not for the better. I remind myself of the way I was regularly so I can compare and contrast... determine whether I'm on the right lines and at the moment I'm walking on a tight rope... slowly advancing forward but wobbling along they way (what to take from this... life is a giant tight rope). People change just like the seasons, slowly, and I think it's important to reflect on how you WERE and how you ARE now. You might not like what you find but maybe that's a good thing. I certainly didn't like it but I am who I am now because of it and because I chose to use it not bury it.
James Mark III is not perfect but he's stable...ish, Mark II broke down completely and Mark I... he is a relic of inspiration, gone but not forgotten... the goal is to make Mark IV (that's 4... right?) similar yet new. I'm a long way off, I can't say right now that I'm truly happy but I know I'm going to get there in the end.
It can be painful, there are things I wish I could forget... just remove it and put it in the bin; job done. Apparently the brain doesn't work like that, instead it seems like it has a vendetta and will surprise me with things I don't particularly want to think about. Despite the negatives, there are days where I am genuinely proud that I sat myself down and just thought about everything then there are days where I wished it would leave me alone, stop following me. There's a big difference between simply remembering and reflecting. I think the best way to define reflection in this case is taking a memory and using it, remembering is just sitting there indulging in the bad thoughts and doing nothing about it. Pain is part of a journey, its inevitable, crap, horrible but useful.
I've made it sound like out of all this... I've suddenly become a better person and that all this is easy. I can be a very cynical and nasty person when it suits me... doing charity work and writing a blog does not make me a saint nor does it erase the stuff I've done, that's staying with me. It's certainly not easy but I am beginning to like the person I am now, he doesn't seem too bad... still a nerd but I don't think that was going to change- I hope it never does.
Maybe change is good and looking back should be done when you've accomplished something great. It might be that I'm doing it all wrong but I know that thinking about people, things and events has caused me a lot of pain but has also given me the motivation to do something about it... it just took me 7 months to realize that. Don't wait. If something's pulling you down, use it. Make a suit of armor with it and fight back. We're human, there's nothing wrong with having bad days, bad weeks or even bad months... I still have them (too many if you ask me) but it's not all doom and gloom, it may feel like it but good things can and do happen and I hope everyone get's their fair share.
The reason I wrote this post is because I realized that I spend a lot of time... thinking, I judge my decisions and remember the things that I had tried to buried, sometimes it has a positive effect then other times it causes tears. I don't know why I do it... maybe its mental torture but I'd like to think it has made me a stronger person, not better... clearer and a tad tougher.
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