Recycling The Past

A very wise man once said that “There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.” This quote, spoken by the largely admired author, CS Lewis, is one that we often take out of context, although its incorrectly taken meaning still manages to encourage and inspire many individuals today.
But, if I may, I’d like to do the unthinkable.
I’m going to disagree.
I’m going to disagree with one of the greatest authors of all time.
The concept of looking forward is one I heavily support and live out in my life. My constant striving is to improve, to grow, to learn, and to expand my horizons in whichever way I can. However, I believe this thinking held by billions of people today is one that leads us to do something that isn’t always a wise idea.
This thinking causes us to abandon our past.
While this action can be taken by many different people in many different situations for different reasons, I’m not convinced that it’s a completely solid idea in any of them.
I’d like to start off with something discussed in the book “The Body Keeps The Score”, a work of psychology literature about trauma and what we know about recovery from it. The biggest takeaway I’ve had so far is that we do not overcome traumatic pasts and circumstances by forgetting about them. We learn from them and work through them by doing just that — thinking about them, analyzing them, and changing our perceptions about them, working through them to get past the traumatic aspect of a certain event or circumstance.
We must not look forward and forget our past in regards to trauma, pain, and heartache. Just think, we overcome the loss of loved ones not by forgetting about them, but by thinking about how important they were to us, the good moments we had, and the overwhelming impact they had on our lives. We have to think about something to get over it. We have to overcome it, not just avoid it and move on.
But this thinking also causes us to forget the lessons we learned, from painful experiences and otherwise.
Not only can we struggle to get over difficult pasts by completely disassociating ourselves from them, but by forging a barrier between us and our life before now can make it difficult to remember the lessons we’ve learned. One of my favorite things to do, something I don’t do often enough, is look back through old journals/planners/texts/emails and see how much I’ve been through, experienced, and gained wisdom from.
Without understanding my past and what I’ve learned and grown from, I have no hope of a better future because I’m not learning from what I’ve already experienced.
Starting over and turning a new leaf is great, but you must not forget what leaves you’ve raked away, what’s stored off to the side, what seems to be rotting away. That is some of the most important wisdom and experience to keep around — that which you have grown from and since let go from the forefront of your mind.
Recycle the lessons you’ve learned. Don’t make the same mistakes twice. Go into your new chapter with a wise remembrance of that which you’ve already been through. You’re now stronger, smarter, and you’re starting anew.
Finally, this thinking of a better future, causing us to abandon our past, can cause us to leave behind some of the good.
“Love is an open door,” as the song goes. If we keep our hearts and minds open, good things can come back. Sometimes we have to let things go, but if they come back, they were meant for us. Keeping your mind open about the recycling the past can lead to some incredible friends who left your life for some reason a long time ago.
By keeping the doors in my life open, I’ve allowed numerous individuals back into my life as mentors, close friends, and family. In our world, cutting ties happens way too often. Starting anew doesn’t mean you have to cut off everything and everyone you know.
Leave them behind, sure, but don’t completely block the idea out of your mind that they might catch up to you, and that you might see a new side of each other and realize that your coming together was meant to be. This happens with long lost friends, seemingly disheveled relationships, and ideas, habits, and even items that we’ve left on the wayside.
Tomorrow can be great. The future seems bright. There are no mistakes committed yet by our future selves.
However, we must not make the mistake now of abandoning the familiar. We learn from the past, we have to work through what we’ve been through, and we have to keep in mind that not everything in our lives has been bad.
Good things have happened to us all. We’ve been through so much, and come out on top. And when we haven’t, we’ve learned from the experience and haven’t fallen down that badly to this day.
There are far better things ahead, of course, but there is some pretty great stuff to recycle from our past, too.
Don’t forget.
