Have you ever reread an old entry you've written and been astonished when it almost bring you to tears? Tears over the emotions it stirs inside you, tears showing your sympathy towards who you used to be and what you were going through, tears over the things that you hoped to change but never did. I love site like these because they give me a clear glimpse of who I used to be, how I used to think. It allows me to remember why exactly it is I felt or thought the way I used; to realize just how flawed I really was all that time.
I suppose this site is very similar to what an old friend of mine referred to it as, as time capsule. It contains all the pain, joy, and moments in your life you can never hope to remember fully or hold onto. Yet, eventually those moments seem less important, less critical to your life, less and less like something you really should be holding onto. Suddenly you see yourself for what you were, a lost girl searching for meaning in her life and falling short. You want to shake her and point out all her mistakes, show her the blind spot in her vision that she just can't see. And yet, you can't help but feel pity for her. She knew no better, you knew no better at the time and you cannot change that.
All you can do is learn to let go, piece by piece, entry by entry, of who you used to be. Sure, that little girl will still be part of who you are, but her struggles were your stepping stones to who you are today, without her you would not be who you are now. But holding onto every misstep, every falter against the struggles of life will only hold you back from looking forward to the future steps you must take. Every moment clinging to too good times you no longer have keeps you from creating new ones.
Despite this we all look over the past, we look to say "Look how far I have a come!" especially when the future seems so daunting. But the future is all we have now and the past has become simply words on a page, memoirs of a time slowly fading into the mists of memory. So, we turn to those entries we wrote in earnest. All those moments when we found ourselves pouring out all our thoughts and words with such vindictive clarity. All those times where we felt we understood. Understood what it mean to be us. Understood what it meant to be human. Understood what it meant to live.
And yet, what we understood then, we don't now. What we thought then seems simple naivety now. What seemed so clear at 16 is so difficult to discern at 22. And so you can't help but wonder, what did any of it ever really mean?
