I agree – we need to take the lessons from the past but live now for the future.

Great post.

Funny comment. Byron Katie has some buddhist references. I’m reading some stuff about that now and it connects with what I do, what I think and what I like and – with what I write. Glad you’ve written down this quote here.

Have you ever come accross a situation where your past was impeding your future?

The way I deal with it is try to get up in the morning with the idea I get a chance or an opportunity to make most of what I learned the day(s) before and take meaningful and enjoyable steps to make future plans / ideas happen.

Every day is also a chance to screw up and pay too much attention to your mistakes or to get all caught up in planning for your future so nothing happens at all. That’s true, but only as far as you’re acting it out.

Statistics are what they are, just like chance, they are descriptions of probability (notice the uncertainties: ‘descriptions’ / ‘probability’).

I believe that by acknowledging these facts about possible failure, the uncertainties, the fear for failure, the longing for the familiar (these are after all also realities that shape us) and by approaching the day as an opportunity for success I feel better equipped to actually make most of my day. I’m far more responsive to opportunities, I’m a much better listener and I’m much happier at the end of the day.

Do I succeed in this all the time? No, of course not. But it helps me from time to time.

In the end in figuring out what’s the best thing to do it all comes down to what you want and what you do. You’re the expert in being you, in experiencing what your ‘now’ is all about. What do you think?

Is the past impeding the future? Change the present!

Later, found Byron Katie musing: “I discovered that when I believed my thoughts, I suffered, but that when I didn’t believe them, I didn’t suffer, and that this is true for every human being.”

thanks for the comment. I would love to hear more about that leap of faith and how you deal with it.

And there’s probably also something like wanting to learn too much from your mistakes. They are what are, nothing more, nothing less. Wanting to see more in them than they actually are can be as time consuming as starting all over from scratch…

great post
Tom