goBack

Hmmm. I had new thoughts present to me. I am still grappling what they mean to me.

It deals with my thoughts about the past.

Did something good get taken away from me?….a death, a financial loss, a relationship, a job, a wrong decision.

Do I have feelings of resentment towards someone or something?

Do I wish I can relive those “Glory Days” as Bruce Springsteen sings about?

Do I wish for those good old days when life seemed to be much simpler and easy?

Should I “goBack” to my past and spend time and energy living there?

Rob Bell in his podcast “The Thing In The Air” #321 speaks about his perceptions on the war in Ukraine and applies his thoughts to a goBack model.

Putin wants Russia to “goBack” to the glory days of the Soviet Union. When the USSR broke up, Putin lost something good as it was taken away from him. He became resentful of that fact and he now has a deep desire to bring it back to how it was. Rob describes being resentful as having those feelings of loss that happen over and over again and you can not get out of that loop. You want to right a wrong and it becomes so strong that eventually you become irrational trying to achieve that goal.

Yet, Ukraine does not want to be a part of that USSR, the old world. They instead want to be part of the new world with new stages of growth and evolving. My mind caught Rob’s remark that Putin is “digging in his heels and he longs for how it used to be”. He wants Ukraine back.

So what I coined from Rob is the phrase “can’t goBack”. I started to think about all the areas in my life where I could or would want to goBack. Have I dug in my heels and long for how it used to be or do I open my hands to receive the new that is unfolding.

There are two outcomes if I goBack. The first one is that I learn from my past, take the good to the present and look to the future with excitement. This gives me a great sense of adventure filled with purpose and imagination.I would be seeking growth through change. Yet, I know that with change can come a sense of “chaos” and the “unknown”, an anticipated form of risk.

or

I can goBack and stay there. I stay stuck in a frame of mind of the past that offers no imagination or creativity. I focus on what was taken, what I resent and I cling and grasp for what was. Like Putin, I dig in my heels and long for how it used to be.

My goal is to be in the present and run the race which is set before me, not rewind the race I have already run.

Eric