It doesn’t matter who you were. It matters who you are.
Likewise, it doesn’t matter what you did. It matters what you’re doing.
And it doesn’t matter where you’ve been. It matters where you’re going.
Some people are crippled by their past, the mistakes they
made, and the failures they’ve been unable to come to grips with. It leaves them frozen in place,
restricted in their development as people. Others live the same dynamic, but because of past success, a
success that causes them to feel as if they’ve arrived, as if they’ve reached
the top of the mountain. They
become as paralyzed, and as stunted in their growth, as those whose failure has
caused their own inhibition.
Each day can be an opportunity to move away from the paralysis,
to inch forward, if even with unremarkable effect. Effort is something each one of us can engage in, and
experience as progress, no matter the degree; like the sensation one might have
when trying to walk across the room after one’s legs have gone to sleep from
lack of circulation. It’s not
easy, but the effort alone will help to bring the legs back to life. Effort cannot disguise itself as
apathy. It is the antithesis of
that. One can feel honest effort within one’s self. And one can take heart in knowing that
movement comes with that effort,
whether the movement is easily measured or not. Results are sometimes very difficult to see, but can often
be illuminated by looking back, by observing the tracks connecting where
we are with where we’ve been, not unlike the trail a snail leaves on the ground
behind its own advancement. And,
lets face it, sometimes our personal movement, our progress if you will, is
little more than a snails pace; but at least it’s movement.
And that’s what counts.
It doesn’t matter who you were. It matters who you are.
Likewise, it doesn’t matter what you did. It matters what you’re doing.
And it doesn’t matter where you’ve been. It matters where you’re going.
