Linear Time.

I very well may have posted on this topic before, but it has been on my mind and I need to clear some space in my tiny brain.
Everyone is familiar ( I would hope) with the concept, 'I wouldn't change the past, it has made me into who I am today'. Well you guessed it, that concept bugs me and I don't like it. The past is a complicated thing to talk about because you can't change it, so you have to live with the life you have created or live with 'the hand you have been dealt'. However you look at the things that shape our lives, we cannot change what is behind us. We thus comfort ourselves by saying that we love who we are, where we've come, the hardships we've survived....blah blah blah. Even though we can't change the past, I don't think we should take this approach. I hate a lot of my life. I regret much. I wish I could do it over. I would 'fix' many things 'wrong' with what I am today. I bet a lot of people would. I think I could have gone through many things to learn many lessons without having to go through what I went through to learn anything. All I have learned is how much I hate much of my history.

Yet I do not dwell on this. I don't mope around wishing. I don't sit and daydream about what could have been. I realize I have to look forward. I realize I have a certain hand which came to me by my choices and maybe by outside influences. I can't get up and walk away from the game. I can't call any timeouts. The beauty of this game too is that you have no competitors. You are playing for a better hand. Once you succeed, you play for a better hand again. You should not settle for a straight when you know you could get a flush.

Anyway. One reason I don't like people saying things that vocalize this concept is that the person saying it presumes to know that their life wouldn't be as appealing to themselves if they didn't get such a bad hand. You cannot change what you have become, but you don't have to concede that what you have become is irreplaceable or the most desirable. If you HAD lived differently, in a better way, I doubt you would say that you wished for harder times to make who you are today better. Another thought: I think for the most part that the people you catch expressing this concept aren't necessarily in hard times. They have either had it good all their life, have risen up from hard times, or their testimony is destructively, hopelessly optimistic. In the face of the very jaws of hell their entire lives, some people will smile, bounce along, and not allow it to effect them. To these people, I direct them to the local pharmacy for there is much more going on that is dangerous than meets the eye.

So there you have it. I regret much of my life and much of the decisions I have made. I don't dwell on the past for I cannot change it, but I know I could be a much better person if it weren't for the things in my past that I regret. I know I can change my life now and for the future, but you can never make up lost time, no matter how you look at it. The past is the past and you can't make it up. You can fool yourself into thinking you can, but in the end, the marathon you didn't run isn't going to help you because you just ran two.