Where is Your Focus?

First a quote: “You can’t start the next chapter of your life if you keep re-reading the last one.” – Michael McMillian

Good morning and happy Monday!

I share today’s missive out of personal experience.?This topic presents an occasional challenge for me personally, perhaps you fight this battle too.

Each of us get exactly 168 hours per week, no more, no less. This is one aspect of life in which fairness reigns supreme. Not one single person ever gets an extra bonus hour, and no one gets cheated by even a minute or two. Each week, we all get exactly:

• 168 hours
• 10,080 minutes
• 604,800 seconds

The variability we experience in life (when compared to other people) comes from how each of us chooses to waste, spend, invest, or perhaps enjoy, each of those 168 hours!

For instance, watching an hour of mindless television is an hour you could have spent creating lasting memories with special people in your life, reading a book, or learning some new skill.

Therein lies the challenge for most of us. For me personally, I can easily get bogged down, repeatedly reliving past mistakes and miscues. Perhaps I did something last week I now wish I had done differently, or better. Maybe I wish I hadn’t done it at all.

It is so easy to spend a great deal of time running countless “would’a, could’a, should’a” scenarios with no real benefit.

The question becomes, can we learn from those mistakes and then leave them where they belong… in the past? Or, do we waste valuable time re-hashing and repeatedly re-living, something we can no longer change.

“One of the most important conversations you might have every day, is the one you have with yourself, about yourself.”

Here is the thing, every minute we spend obsessing about something in our past, is a minute we’re stealing from ourselves today; we’re choosing to rob ourselves of life’s most precious gift… and that gift is the present! (Perhaps it is called “the present” because it is a gift of time we can enjoy, use, or waste.)

See reading recommendation for "The Present;" below.

Each minute you spend regretting yesterday is a minute you don’t get to spend living differently, or better, today.

?“Don’t let yesterday take up too much of today.” – Will Rogers

While I profess needing to improve in this area as well, I offer a few ideas I have found to be helpful in this area of my life: (Please know I welcome your advice on this topic as well. I would love to share your “lessons learned” with other readers.)

• Look for lessons learned – experiences, both good and bad, are how we learn, grow, and mature.?When we learn from our mistakes, we grow. As you already know, not learning from our mistakes is a mistake. Repeating mistakes we should have learned from is the biggest mistake of all.
• Forgive yourself for not being perfect – Accepting our failures and flaws as a human characteristic is the first step in overcoming past mistakes. If we don’t expect others to be perfect, why do so many of us tend to beat ourselves up for not being perfect??Striving for continuous improvement is good, striving for perfection may be destructive.
• Forgive others for not being perfect. – perhaps you have been wronged by someone and haven’t been able to let go of the bitterness or anger. If that event continues to be a source of pain, ask yourself why you continue to hang on to it? Maybe it is time to forgive and forget. (Hurting people hurt people.)
• If appropriate, apologize and ask for forgiveness. Enough said.
• Choose better, not bitter. While we can’t control what happens to us in life, we can choose our response to what happens to us. We can choose to become better, or bitter. (Choosing to be bitter or resentful, they say, is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. Holding on to bitterness is not good for your health and will shorten your life.) Bitterness is a choice… so it better. Which are you choosing?
• Write it down and let it go – Continuing to dwell on past mistakes is like fertilizing the weeds in your life and disregarding the grass. What you focus on will continue to be a controlling factor in your life.
• Give yourself 5 minutes – If you just can’t stop re-reading last week’s chapter, make it legitimate for 5 minutes. Set a timer and when the time is up, start writing a better chapter this very minute.?You are the author of your life.

What advice would you offer to those who keep re-reading life's last chapter?

Recommended Reading:

• The Present; The Gift for Changing Times by Spencer Johonson

Related Articles:

• Would You Say That To A Friend? | LinkedIn
• Which Fire are you Feeding? | LinkedIn
• Making a Mental Shift; Reducing Stress in Stressful Times! | LinkedIn
• Don't Worry, Be Happy, Think Intentionally! | LinkedIn

How will you live, love, or lead, differently, or better, this coming week?

* Revised and updated. Originally published on June 28, 2021.

Sincerely,

Bryan Yager

“Expanding Your Capacity for Success”

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Bonus Quotes:

• “The hardest part about moving forward is not looking back.” – Elizabeth Thomas
• “Don’t dwell on what went wrong. Instead, focus on what to do next. Spend your energies on moving forward toward finding the answer.” – Denis Waitley
• “Don’t look back you’re not going that way.” – Mary Englebright
• “Faith is moving forward even when things don’t make sense, trusting that in hindsight everything will become clear.” – Many Hale
• “I’m looking forward to the future and feeling grateful for the past.” – Mike Rowe
• “You know you are on the right track when you become uninterested in looking back.” – Mel Robbins
• “You can’t reach what’s in front of you until you let go of what’s behind you.” – Louise Armstrong
• “The best career advice I’ve gotten is to stay focused, and to keep moving forward.” – Tyga
• “When you bring peace to your past, you can move forward to your future.” – Unknown ?
• “One of the most important conversations you might have every day, is the one you have with yourself, about yourself.” – Bryan Yager