Weekly Musing #19 Look back to learn, look forward to build.

A good metaphor for how to live your life is the one of driving; you occasionally glance in the rear-view mirror but you keep your eyes on the road in front of you, and you probably have an idea of where you want to end up as well.

Sounds easy but one of the hardest things to do is to find the balance between on one hand looking back at what has gone before with an intent to learn, and on the other hand looking back and getting stuck, dwelling on what has been with regret and negative nostalgia.

The past is important, it should act as a school, full of lessons to take as you design and build your future, but just as we need to leave school and continue with our lives, putting the theory to practice, we need to take what we have learned in life and put that to good use going forward.

As I was thinking about what to write about today, I found myself, as so often before, spending time with a thesaurus, a book of synonyms. I love picking a word, following its etymology (where it comes from) down to its roots and then back up again, comparing it with other words that mean the same thing but usually have a slightly different meaning depending on which context they are put in. Then of course looking up all the antonyms as well, the opposites of the words I am looking for. Sometimes a good word can come out of first picking a word, finding a couple of synonyms, finding their antonyms, and then going back from them and seeing where you end up.

A whole new word for me today was “disempowerment”, the opposite of “empowerment”. When contemplating that word and what it meant to me, I came up with this text about not letting yourself being disempowered by your past, but instead using your past to empower your future.

And yes, the main difference between learning from the past and dwelling on the past, is that learning is empowering, and dwelling is disempowering.

So accept, admit and understand your past, and use it to build your future.

Building your future from today and onwards, a future that is aligned with your dreams and hopes, starts with you simply looking forward. But as I have written so many times before, its not looking forward with “I wish that” or “If only I could” thinking, we’re not talking about wishful thinking here.

It’s looking forward with a “I want” and “I intend to” and “I am going to” thinking.

Create long-term and short-term goals, use the S.M.A.R.T acronym to make them Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound.

Examples of that would be;

Specific: Instead of saying, “I want to be successful,” define what success looks like for you. Maybe it’s “I want to run my own company within two years.” or any other very specific goal.

Measurable: Attach numbers or milestones to your goals to measure and follow up progress. If your goal is about fitness, don’t just say, “I want to get fit.” Say, “I aim to lose 20 pounds in six months” or “I want to run 10k under 60 minutes”.

Achievable: Be realistic with your goals. If you’ve never run a mile, setting a goal to complete a marathon in a month may not be realistic. A more achievable goal could be, “I want to be able to run 5K without stopping in six months”

Relevant: Make sure your goals align with your broader life objectives. If you’re focused on career growth, a relevant goal could be, “I will attend two industry conferences this year to network and learn”, or if your goal is about your own company, it could be about long-term networking in LinkedIn to build a good supportive network of people you will need when you start up.

Time-bound: Every goal should have a timeframe. It could be as short as a day or as long as a decade. Time limits create urgency and help you prioritize. For example, “I will learn the basics of Photoshop by the end of the month to enhance my graphic design skills.”

And create a vision for yourself as well, what is your vision for the future, the next 5, 10 years, the rest of your life?

Then make sure to check-in with yourself on an annual basis and a 5-year basis. Check the map so to speak. Are you headed in the right direction? have you deviated? Or even worse, have you not moved at all towards your goals since your last check-in?

And that puts us back to where we begun, glancing back but looking forward.

If, where you find yourself and what you see in the rear-view mirror is according to plan and the result of a conscious choice, then fine. But if you feel disappointed and unhappy with your situation, then don’t stop too long in that place, don’t start dwelling on the past, move forward! Read my weeks musing of moving out of the problem and into the solution!

Surround yourself with people who share your ideas goals for the future, try to move away from the ones that drain you of energy and vision.

LinkedIn is an incredibly powerful tool for finding good, use it and build a good network of supportive people. Embrace new opportunities to learn and grow, be it through courses, books, or mentorship.

Remember that life isn’t forever, we are all on a timer after all, so try to learn from every new past that you create and keep moving forward.

If you get stuck living in the past, you risk never experiencing your future.