Shouting from my shed

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Move on. Don’t look back

hawaii

I was at a book reading one evening recently when the author was asked whether he remained in contact with people he had met on his travels.
His answer was that yes, he did remain in contact with some people. But he felt that this was not necessarily always a good thing. Email exchanges, for example, tend to become more brief, less interesting and less frequent until they fizzle out to occasional bounced platitudes that make you realise that there is nothing left to say. At times then it can be preferable to have a good experience, enjoy someone’s company, but then to move on and for both of you to leave it only as a happy memory.

This struck home with me as being really true, but as something that I had not realised before.
And then, later that evening, purely by chance, I bumped into one of the multitude of kind strangers who had hosted me when I was cycling round the world. A stranger who had become a good friend while I was with his family. I had no idea he was in England now, let alone that he would be in London. It was a shock, but a nice one for I had fond memories of fun times together.
Yet after the pleasure of saying hello we had nothing left to say, and both made our excuses to move on, our memories of a happy shared experience sullied slightly.

Sometimes it is best to live in the moment, appreciate for what it is, and not to try to prolong it when it is over.

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Comments

  1. lee hughes Posted

    excellent post Al, one of my favourites. I can relate to it a lot. After falling in love on my travels we kept in touch via email which has faded now, it’s a shame but it’s the beauty of life really. Stop looking in the past and live life moment to moment.

    Keep the excellent posts coming 🙂

    Reply
  2. Mike Barnes Posted

    This thought reminded me of the Felix Dennis poem – ‘Never go back’.

    http://www.felixdennis.com/poem.php?C=2&T=35&B=3

    I refer to it when I realize I’m resting on laurels, it gives me a good slap.

    Great post.

    Mike.

    Reply
  3. nice post al and photo too! just in from cycling and eating in taiwan. very hot!
    bit busy this week but how about a drink next week. see if you can bump into some old friends

    tom

    Reply
  4. Rob CHambers Posted

    Anone from your books?

    Reply
  5. Rob: yes… 😉

    Reply
  6. This is so true. Sad, but true.

    Reply
  7. Tim Posted

    Al

    I’m a bit late on the take up here but I love this post.

    It got me thinking about how a similar principle might apply to other things – places that aren’t the same when you go back, songs you love until you overplay them and food that isn’t as sweet the second time around.

    I’d not had the guts to think about it applying to people before. Great stuff.

    Tim.

    PS Also enjoying and impressed by the ever expanding content of your site – keep up the good work!

    Reply
  8. I received this email from a mate I ran the Marathon des Sables with. He is currently cycling through India (http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=791435595&ref=ts#/group.php?gid=96122367652&ref=mf)-

    “I was thinking about your post the other day regarding never looking back. Clearly I have time in the day to think about such things. It strikes me as interesting that although you were left with a slightly soured memory by bumping into that friend, surely by the nature of the other half of your job as author, speaker and motivator you are continually forced to look back as a means to go forward with other projects such as South. How does this fit in with the principle that I tend to agree with as well of not looking back, or as suggested in the poem reflecting too much in the past?

    Reply
  9. My reply to Tom –
    I guess there needs to be a balance. Look back a bit to learn, reflect, bask a bit. But don’t live in the past:

    “And I hope when I get old I don’t sit around thinking about it
    but I probably will
    Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture
    a little of the glory of, well time slips away
    and leaves you with nothing mister but
    boring stories of glory days….”

    Reply

 
 

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