A Look Back — What Is The Significance Of Self-retrospection?
If we turn around for once and stare deep at our own footsteps, what would we find? Have we strayed too far from our original path? How much have we lost along the way?
As our steps tread forward — how the way of life goes — we aim to reach the impossible, the inevitable, the true goals of ours. To summit this peak, we meticulously conjure a path to follow, but the tunnel vision this brings solidifies further our seemingly narrow approach towards it. Only when someone stops us and asks “Where are you coming from?” do we realize the utter beginnings of our journey. How far have we come? How much have we lost along the way? Have we strayed too far from our original path?
To initiate this vital discussion, I would now begin narrating a crucial three-act story that blends the inner weavings of the corresponding subject, for it is the story of a man who never looked back.
The Man Who Never Looked Back
It is in Nature’s nature to seldom sprawl true miracles. Yet what is done of them only remains in our own wretched hands.
He was born an only-son, the parents of whom spectacularly showered him with pools of unrelenting love, belonging to an exceedingly long family line of wood craftsmen. And what did they all craft? Toys. Small, crudely sculpted, and simple, toys.
It was the only business they possessed and what eventually made their ends meet, enough for a family of three to not die of hunger, yet not enough to have a larger roof over their heads and buy good-looking clothes as they could simply dream of such, seldom even squabbling for basic needs. But for the little kid, his wildest dreams had materialized since he couldn’t have wished for anything better than to have a world of toys within his little grasp.
Growing up, he would naturally never run out of beautifully etched toys to play with, etched by the skillful hands of his mother and father. For long hours he would sit not only playing but ogling at the wonder of how mundane-looking half-cut logs of wood would transform magically into dancing caricatures of monkeys, rabbits, birds, and dolls, all achieved solely by the exquisite hands of his bearers. Extraordinary! Soon, his mere toys began laying bare as the only thing fascinating him truly was the process of this craftsmanship. He wished to learn how to make them.
This single thought of sculpting toys out of his own imagination, by his own hands, soared his enthrallment through the roof! And so after episodes of wailing and weeping, he was taught, little by little, the skills that their forefathers perfected over pain-staking generations. But rather surprisingly, he seemed to get the hang of it remarkably quick. Perhaps, he was a natural at it.
Each day he would wake up, he remained thoroughly grateful for realizing the kind of family and work he was born into, practicing more upon the newly learned craft as he inched up. Gratitude exploded further within his veins when he would see meager toddlers in shabby clothing and dirt-ridden faces line up right outside the step of his home, when his bearers would give these needy kids certain surplus and leftover sculpted toys from their warehouse. Many of those originally lay discarded by the clients due to minute imperfections, and others just expressed a last-minute change about what kind of toy they initially desired. Nevertheless, all these pieces rested in their godown quite unpurposeful, yet they would evidently find purpose amidst the giddy eyes of these innocent striplings.
This solitary task fascinated the only-son beyond reason! Although he wondered why they were being given monkeys without arms, cats without paws, or dogs without legs, when they could have shiny new caricatures instead. Indelibly at that moment he swiftly decided to sculpt his first-ever toy from the ground up, still being quite young for his age when he did. Splinters of wood flew off the wood as he began carving through one mundane-looking log in the middle of his parent’s sound sleep. Astonishingly, out came the initial crude outline of one, and so he followed with the rest, modeling different rough-sketched toys in bulks.
His bearers were beyond elated, quite shocked the next morning when they found their only little son giving out his hand-made work to the dingy-dressed kids at their doorstep. But bounds more elated was the son himself, seeing the extraordinary smiles relishing and sparkling on the numerous small faces. His own lips were wide enough to be overflowing from sheer content. This moment, this feeling he could never forget. Yet in due time, he unfortunately will.
This sole task stipulated the early carving years of their son, and the parents couldn’t be any prouder. Out of the extra logs, he would sculpt new caricatures with passion, all to give out to less fortunate kids for merely zero cost. But the moment his crafting got meticulously shape-full and exquisitely detailed, his parents grew realizing the tantamount caliber of their only-child.
Only 15 years of age at the time, he was inventing entirely new techniques to carve seemingly complex and impossible shapes out of the wood. There was undoubted talent in his small hands leading his bearers to begin including him in the real money-making work, with the son’s only condition being that he would never stop carving and giving the toys to those needy children, the twinkling smiles of whom he could not wait to ogle at each time they rustled by. While he did help his parents in the growing name of their business, what truly became his purpose was to see those smiles rise upon those dirt-smudged faces.
As his love for the craft further unfurled, his skills furnished immaculate with it. His bearers could not help but witness how their son’s signature minute craftsmanship made each customer laud and applaud the sensational work. Undeniably, high-praising words began chiming throughout the small district he lived in. And by the time his years struck 19, done through with school, his name rang in every resident’s mouth and loud. Likely, profits in the business were booming too, all thanks to the new kind of superlatively sculpted toys he solely perfected to make leading his parents to make the then-sensible decision of marking their son as the new face of their work. This stamped the humble beginnings of their son’s phenomenal success to come.
Out in the sea, there exists no fish to be caught only by a singular fisherman
In the small district of this wood-crafter’s abode, other toy manufacturers existed, too. Famous they were, too. Yet, the only-son’s work was beyond anything the competition ever managed to produce, all for a fragment of the cost that they ever produced it with. Indisputably, the entire city-wide people were shifting towards him and his exemplified work. Quite irritably for the opposition, they had to gulp down his bonafide brilliance like a brick and realize that his damned business was hogging up their whole market.
While the sound of it did intimidate him at first, when this wonder-kid was invited to meet one of his seeming foes — a young son of a business tycoon — rather remarkably, a great friend came out at the other end of it. Being recognized for the glorious work he portrayed day in and out, a resourceful partnership was concluded between the two. And incidentally, this very act provided him with his most magnanimous break yet.
What he gained significantly out of the newly made partnership was not just a miraculous friendship, but also through the fresh contacts, he met with the highest paying customer yet, a high-ranking official of the state who needed several thousands of the skillfully etched famous toys at their disposal. Fortunately, the workforce provided by the recent coalition with his friend was immaculate, and that gave him all of the resources to start performing this mammoth undertaking.
Day and night he worked pertinaciously, ensuring not a single piece should move without him scanning the minute imperfections, moreover, he also managed to sculpt extra for when he would give to the poor little kids next. Not even for a bit he forgot those large smiles cherishing upon their small faces. It still meant the world to him.
It appeared that his whole life had culminated to this singular moment. And inexorably, when he successfully delivered the mammoth order before time to the said official, he was praised through the roof by not just the elated customer, but some of the highest-ranked people in the land of his birth. This single job opened an overwhelming number of doors for him. Not just the district he grew up in, but rather the entire state now memorized his initials etched on each piece sculpted out from his company. With his good friend and partner by his unswerving side, he was then able to garner substantially larger orders from the high-ranked politicians not just of his state, but of virtually every state. The business spread wide like wildfire, the workforce he owned grew 100 folds, and the manufacturing process administered of a scale he never imagined once possible. Such phenomenal was his rise.
Naturally, such an important man as himself would be required to travel across the country then, meeting various clients upon their destined lands. As a direct result, he would sparingly ever be home. A month may go by without him seeing his own loving father’s and mother’s wrinkle-seaming faces, both of whom had long retired from the game and were spending their days amply away longing to squander time along with their only-son.
On the other spectrum, such exposure proved of stark value to the son, meeting uncountable high-profile customers over vastly lavish dinners and big-mouthed exotic talks. During one of these, a riveting suggestion was offered to him by a remarkably wealthy woman, a whole empire spanned under her feet as she spoke her intricately heedful words.
The stated proposal was to expand from only toy-making to sculpting top-precision wood components of gargantuan ships, most of which in the country she solely owned. Such a venture would supposedly bring him at least fifty times more capital in only half the time as compared to mere toy-selling enterprise. Massive intrigue was soon to follow in his mind after this predicament, such enormously that only after a night’s thinking, he concluded to pursue this new direction.
Three months long was his original trip that got indefinitely expanded henceforth. He was then required to reach different sailing ports in the country and study the ship instruments that he would eventually be manufacturing. He didn’t take long to take on the first big order. How hard could it be? And for his unmatched skill and pivotal experience, nothing seemed out of his reach. Like clockwork, he delivered a mere hundred components and profits equivalent to selling 100,000 toys flowed right in. Astonished and stupefied beyond his wildest dreams, at last, his business was staggeringly booming!
By the time his age struck 30, his fortune had established him to become one of the richest people in the world, along with being the largest manufacturer of wooden-ship instruments not only in his country but across all the seas. Through the continents his high-precision parts would soar, making him millions upon billions. Since the ordinary toys were only responsible for about a meager 5% of the made profits, the cost of carving them soon outweighed their financial virtues. The board took virtually no time in suggesting to ditch sculpting such toys entirely.
His company was no longer a toy manufacturer it once was as a result. And the great old friend of his, with whom he shared a humble 50–50 partnership for a long good decade, his share was slashed down to an insulting 1%. Assuredly, this friend had become a business liability, he didn’t remain of the use he once was, it was said to be purely a financial decision. Yet, hurt and infuriated jarringly by this insinuating proposal, his friend ultimately quit the company and swore to never be seen again.
But for the only-son, now an owner of a multi-billion worth corporation, it was no time to sulk away in any sorrow of his companion’s troubling departure. This was his glory. This was his time. His greatness was unquestionable for it was the peak he had reached. The profit margins his deliveries ushered were inconceivable, the daily cash inflow was a literal river of money. There was absolutely nothing that could go wrong in his mind. Still, it all eventually did.
High up above, where each step is unforgiving, each breath thinning, it only takes a single slip to conclude one’s entire demise.
He was at the minister’s dine-in chamber, in the middle of a teething laugh when the news was whispered low into his ear. ”Your father has passed away this morning.”
No shock followed up on his face, no traces of any feeling at first since he straightaway could not process such a thing in its proper sense. Amidst the shimmering glow of gleaming cutlery, residing beside such remarkable connections at hand, he could not make himself leave without raising some heavy brows. So, he stayed until it was all over, postponing his urgency for the time being, marking the processing of his grief for a moment in the future. And when he respectfully could leave, after the business was wholly done, he took the first way home.
Yes, his father was dead.
And by the time he reached, the body was already 6 feet under, for days-late he was in arriving at his own abode. He found the surprising sight and familiar face of his once great friend amongst the people gathered, apparently being the sole one who was swift to carry out all the necessary formalities once his father’s heart gave up, being the sole one present in the last moments. He did try to speak to his once good companion, wanting to know how his father truly was in the final moments, wishing to hear what words were spoken before his death. Alas, still infuriated and hurt, his friend didn’t utter a single word.
Oh, how he wished to see his father’s face for one last time! To hear his voice even, but too late it had gotten. All was done and dusted. He saw the sadness in his widowed mother’s slope-lidded eyes and decided to stay at home for more than his usual one-day stop. Although it had only been a week away from work, demanding letters began dropping at his doorstep out of strict urgency. Drastically crucial deliveries and quite expensive orders were lining up like water rising above a clogged drain, and all was about to flow over his head.
The countable days he decided to stay, he did numb her mother’s pain but only a singular thing she could chime again and again. “Please stay, son… Please stay.” But how could he? His duty to make profits called him, longed for him.
She begged him to stay, scared out of her mind of the thought of continuing to live alone without seeing her son’s face for months-long at end, only a few days in a whole year it would be. She didn’t want to live like this. Moreover, she never wished to die like this. But the son couldn’t stay any longer. His clients were gnawing to make more buck, requesting to maintain his all-important appearances around the globe to where he could never make his mother carry. So, he left. Even though his mother never wished to die without her son by her side, she ultimately took her last breath one woeful dawn, still longing for him to come as he quite failed to do.
It was only months after his father’s death that his mother left the realm of the living. The son got hold of this news rather late, all the result of being at a months-long ship sail for demonstration of his wooden apparels. Not a slither of tear twinkled in his eyes upon hearing such news, since quite like before, he had postponed his grief indefinitely to a different time. The sail-trip ended and he found his way back home once more.
The moment he stepped inside his abode, the walls of which he had mapped and tracked all his childhood, the memories that chimed through the stones that built it, the unrelenting love his bearers had showered infinitely upon him, all buoyed up inside only to explode right out into existence. The walls now lay barren, the stones purposeless, the love eroded beyond recognition. It had gone dark, deserted, eerily desolate. And like a boulder crashing down, the reality crushed his soul entirely.
He rage-erupted into heavy tears, fell defeated upon his knees, his wails and weeps shrilled through the dark walls of his abode. His continually postponed grief had shattered open all at once, realizing finally the unfathomable things he had lost, the people he had lost. But no amount of screaming could ever bring them back. He never again wished to leave his home.
Days, weeks, even months went by in such a state. Persuasive letters barged at the doors demanding his all-crucial presence at the company, but he never responded. The water was clogging up again, this time gushing to his head in waves. Yet he stood unbudged.
It was soon realized that this could not go on for long. So, while he, the owner of a multi-billion worth enterprise lay sulking in grief for months alone, a drastic collective decision had to be made to kick him out of his own fortune.
A final letter knocked on his door. This time he opened it just so he could end this frequent barging of ardent lawyers. He signed off his fortune in seconds for he no longer cared for it, not even a single bit.
And there it all laid. The life he had, the loving mother and father he had, the craft, the sense of purpose he had, shattered into unrecognizable pieces. The moment his sleepless eyes opened each morning, a hoarding black cloud would grow over him, a cloud of truth it was, raining down tears every single day. He would fight hard but the truth always prevailed, no matter how harsh it seemed to be. Nothing remained in his life that he looked forward to with glee, all in disdain.
The only thing left then was the remaining sulk-ridden days of his life where he would dread each morning waking up, dread each breath enduring him to live. His body was surely living to any outside observer, but deep down, his soul had outright died, never to be reborn, never to live again. Such was the tragic becoming of the man who never looked back.
Born a miracle, died a tragedy, for he was the man who never looked back.
Now, to my readers, I may care to ask this question. What if this man mustered enough courage and brevity to truly look back? What change would accompany his life? What would then become of him? Would he still end in a tragedy?
What if the man looked back?
If this man had learned to tread his steps cautiously, to not put his eyes solely on the prize forward but also gain the resilience to halt the progress and look backward seldom, he would have found the nimble kid he was who had basked in the immense love of his bearers throughout his childhood. He would have seen the very first steps of his being when his father gave him the initial introduction to the toy-making craft. Yes, the toys he adored to sculpt infinitely so!
Looking back, he indelibly would have relished the endearing smiles of feeble, undernourished, and shabby-clothed children for whom he would especially craft such toys and give his literal heart out. For years this crucial tradition was followed aiding to expand his love over his work magnanimously. Yet this task was lost amidst the strict urgency to make more bang for the buck.
If he focused more intricately on his way back, he might have noticed the one and only great friend he managed to make, the person he was respected by so dearly, and who taught him the faint realities of life that he ever failed to know, who gave him his first big break into the high leagues, a person whom he should have always been grateful for, and should have carried all the way through his successes.
If he had just looked back only for a moment, he would have gauged the very things that made him, him. And rather than ending in a tragedy, the man’s life might not have reached the epitome of success it once did, but he surely would have reached the epitome of his own happiness as it always should. He would then become a man who looked back and learned to save his life.
Such a paramount role the task of looking back would have played in that poor man’s life. But now, what about our lives? What can we learn from the tragic becoming of the man who never looked back?
The Significance of Looking Back
It is an innate human tendency that with each decision made, the only place we gaze at is the immediate future it may pertain. Another such decision, another step forward. And this cycle gleefully bites its own tail throughout our vast decision-making lives. One after the other, we tread ahead. Although this makes up for tantamount progress, a gradual dis-remembrance of what made us who we are shadows it indubitably. How did we reach here? What did we lose on the way? No one ever informs us to just stop for a second and turn around, not to revert our steps but to only ogle at them with relishing eyes.
No matter where we are or what we deduce to do next, if we do not take our time to peer at our way back, we may find ourselves getting sucked into a monstrous black hole of sadness and distress without ever realizing the fact. Utterly like the tragic becoming of the man who never looked back, the cognizance of calculating the precise journey to our present might arrive too late.
Understanding such true significance of looking back, over the past few years, I have grown to become an avid practitioner of the said task. For now, I will attempt to look back at my own past year’s work. And it has been such a year of revelations! Ever since my first pursuit of finding ways to express myself through writing, I have discovered more and more readers along the way. Here on Medium, I grew from 0 to 100, to 500, and more! What did I ever do to gain this audience? What were my posts of the past year?
Let me stroll you through five of the best ones -
1. Anxiety — The Truth Behind It
Discussing the intense and all-crucial topic of anxiety is where I started off my year, a feeling that can devastate even the best of us if ever left unchecked. Like most of us, I used to have a bleak relationship with anxiety, but how I have changed! And you can change too! Including a step-by-step guide to triumph over our meaningless and avoidable anxiety, I penned all the ways that one can overcome this bludgeoning monster, and the overwhelming responses I got from it really made me glad that I ever chose this topic to write upon.
Link — Anxiety — The Truth Behind It
QTA (Quote to Take Away) —
Unfortunately, anxiety is incurable, being the lone reason why it is so widespread in our world. But fortunately, each of us possesses every tool necessary to control anxiety for whenever it barges in and hits us with a bag full of uncertainty.
2. Free Will (The Conundrum of Choice)
Who hasn’t wondered about the true nature of Free Will at least once in their lifetime? Backed by real scenarios and scientific research in tandem, I explored the possibilities of Free Will solely being an illusion or being an actual act of choice. But remarkably, I found the answer to be quite different than anything I had ever hoped for, making this another fitting addition to my thought-provoking library of content present here.
Link — Free Will (The Conundrum of Choice)
QTA —
True Free Will gets birthed from the freedom of choice, but each and every conscious decision that we ever take in our entire lives is always (and will always will be) confined by our own surroundings.
3. Need of Boredom
In this piece of writing, I indulge heavily in the pure necessity and sheer relevance of being bored in our lives. At first, it may seem odd but the relevance remains quite monumental as I found through my own experiences. In it, I insist one ask themselves, “When was the last time I allowed myself to be bored?” and realize how matters of true importance scuttle up from deep within our consciousness and help us live a fuller and happier life.
Link — Need of Boredom
QTA —
This encapsulation of mind within itself, of boredom, is undoubtedly necessary, as it can directly lead us into taking actions that might well turn out to be entirely positive for our livelihood, actions that one would never take without the existence of this state.
4. Genes Vs Character — The Battle Between Nature and Nurture
I can proudly say that this is my most researched piece yet. In it, I discuss the age-old Nature Vs Nurture debacle and made a monumental discovery of reality by the end of it. Abetted by remarkable scientific indagation I find the true answers to some of the centuries-old questions like; What makes us, us? Is our character developed or inherited? What defines the way that we behave, the way that we truly are?
Link — Genes Vs Character — The Battle Between Nature and Nurture
QTA —
The right acts can influence the right environment, and inversely, the right environment can also trigger the right genes. It is a feedback loop. Whether it would be positive or negative, is for our actions to decide.
5. What is Our Thought-speak? (Understanding the Language of Thought)
I have always wondered quite deeply about our minds and how our thoughts communicate within the fields of our own brains. What is the true “language” in which one thinks? Wanting to find the answer to it led me to write another research-filled article on a deeply interesting topic, the conclusion of which needs to be remembered by each and every human in the world (in my opinion, of course). Just ask yourself this once: “If I never learned any language, in what language would I ever think? Would I actually be able to think at all?”
Link — What is Our Thought-speak?
QTA —
Once we finally understand our distinct thought-speak, once we crack the code of our subconscious thoughts and learn its apparent semantics, we can then use it to practically rewire our whole brains!
Below are some honorable mentions -
1. The Son’s Speech (A short story)
2. The Wordle Philosophy
3. A Discussion With My Enemies
4. Taking the Blue Pill
5. Beauty of Lies
The Conclusion of Looking Back
It is ironic to think how many human tendencies are meant to literally destroy us eventually if went unchecked. Maybe we are so eerily designed where the choice of our whole destruction lies within our own grasp. Depending on how we acknowledge and exercise this given power, it can turn evil or be a blessing. Because by aptly using this monumental power, we can always decide to have a look back at the path from which we came, gaze at what made us, how did we reach our present place, and what things of terrible importance we may have lost on the way.
The sole reason behind my elaborate piece of writing is to clarify this task’s monumental significance in the general happiness of our being. And I thank you wholeheartedly for being a part of this journey, being here till the end.
Now, I will only leave its ultimate practice to you, my readers, for your growth and your destruction, both lay in your own hands. So, do as you please and decide the kind of path you wish to take.
And before entirely concluding this post I just want to thank all of my readers who have stuck with me throughout the year. I may not be able to post as frequently as many of the creators here, but I will never stop writing and publishing my work out to people like you who have encouraged me and supported me through thick and thin. As for me, writing is like breathing itself. To stop it would mean to suffocate my will to live.
Thank you all!
And have a blessed year ahead!
Thank you so much for reading!
I hope this unique post instills grave thought among my readers and makes one realize the miraculous philosophies that seldom hide under the most mundane things in our daily lives.
I wish you all to stay safe and have a great life ahead. Please leave your claps and thoughts in the comments below. I would really appreciate it!
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