Back in the spring, I listened to a podcast episode titled How Have You Changed in the Last 10 Years? In it, podcast host Laura Tremaine and her longtime friend, Meg Tietz, reflected on the changes they had experienced in the previous decade. Their discussion touched on how their lives, their work, and their families had changed over the previous ten years and, taking things to a deeper level, how they themselves were emotionally and spiritually different from the women they had been ten years in the past. It was a fascinating conversation that achieved its stated goal of prompting a great deal of self-reflection from me as a listener. I knew this was a topic I wanted to contemplate further, in my personal journals and possibly even here on the blog.
I have been pondering the subject for some time now, or at least the IDEA of the subject. That’s not uncommon for me: a blog idea frequently needs a lengthy germination period before I feel ready to put my full thoughts to paper keyboard. More often than not, my thoughts build gradually until they naturally spill out into a (hopefully) coherent post. But with this idea, I was experiencing some resistance; each time I sat down to brainstorm, my usual writing fervor was replaced with dread. I chose to listen to that silencing voice, pressing pause on the ten-year reflection to ask myself a different question instead: why was it so difficult for me to write about how I had changed in the past ten years? What was driving this resistance?
Now, it probably comes as no surprise that I’m a huge fan of contemplation and reflection. I’m the gal who meticulously documents every aspect of my life, a small fraction of which you see in my blog writing. So a ten-year reflection seems like an easy sell. But truthfully? Returning to the past is not always easy for me. Reading old journals or blogs, or even looking at old pictures, stirs up a plethora of conflicting emotions. When the past memories are fond ones, there’s nostalgia for a period that cannot be reclaimed. I worry that my best days are behind me, and feel sad that I have not grown or improved in ways I hoped I might. Conversely, when past memories are difficult ones, I experience regret over what could have been and shame that it wasn’t different. Sometimes, recognizing my own growth can result in an inflated present-day ego that I then feel burdened to keep in tact. Nearly every scenario leads me to second-guess either my past or present self (often BOTH), evoking all sorts of confusing comparisons between differing versions of myself and leading to some painful mental gymnastics as I attempt to cast both the past and the present in an impossibly rosy light.
Writing publically about how I’ve changed adds a whole extra layer of self-doubt. How will others perceive these changes? And if those reading knew me then AND now, will they see what I see? If not, am I wrong in my own recollections and interpretations?
It would be easy to give my mental hangups a win on this one. Nobody is making me think about—let alone write about—how I have changed in the last ten years. It was meant to be a fun little prompt, not an existential crisis. But it was a prompt I really did want to write about, even if it might not be easy. The fact that I was experiencing SO MUCH resistance was a sign that it would probably be an especially healthy exercise for me to push through.
I decided to give myself a new challenge: I would write about how I had changed in the last ten years AND I would do so in a judgment-free zone. I would document the changes without denigrating the past OR criticizing my present. I would be an impartial observer, showing compassion and graciousness to both versions of myself: ten-years-ago Kendra, and present-day Kendra too. No need to prove anything, to myself or to anyone else.
The act of nonjudgmental observation is easy to talk about, harder to practice. It’s not something I can easily do on my own. Thankfully, I am not (and was not) alone. When those critical tendencies start to crop up, I can hand them over to The One who was there then AND now, who walked with me through the good and bad times of ten years ago and is still walking with me today. I can take solace in knowing that my past and my present and even my future rest in His capable hands; He forgives the regrets and celebrates the victories, He holds me in my pain and rejoices with me in the moments that are most beautiful. He can help me make peace with the parts of my life and myself that I don’t want to face; He can redeem every shortcoming; and—most importantly—He can help me rightly-prioritize my self-indulgent thoughts within the grand scheme of His will for each and every moment of my life.
Well. . . I mentioned above that my ideas often need a long runway before they’re ready to take flight. This one needed so much runway that I am just settling into the subject at hand and see that this post has already exceeded 800 words. Now that I’ve warmed up to the idea of a ten-year deep-dive, I would like to dedicate plenty of time and space to the topic, so I plan to return to the subject with my actual reflections in next Monday’s post.
Before we go, I’m wondering: what does this question bring up for you? Do you experience any reluctance or resistance when asked to reflect on the past? If so, are your reasons similar to mine? If they are, perhaps you can take my approach to observing the past without feeling a need to bring judgment or comparison into the observation. And you can join me in inviting God to walk with you down memory lane; He cares about you and wants to be there as you reflect.
