Build on what you would change

Published 12:00 am Friday, November 29, 2002

There are things that happen each and every day that have a direct impact on what our tomorrow will become. It has taken me all my 25 years on Earth to realize just how much the events of today form the shap of our tomorrow. I know many might say 25 years isn't long enough to form a decent opinion, let alone regret the things done in the past.

I bet if I took a poll of the people reading this right this instant, 100 percent would tell me something has tak place in their life that they would like to do over again. But what I would like to know is, what would you change? Would you change something about yourself or someone else?

Would you change something that you have done in the past, or change something that was done to you?

I know there are many things I would like to change, not so much about my self, but about the things I have done.

I would like to take back a day in seventh grade and try to be just a little bit nicer to a girl who would not live to see a day in the eighth grade.

I would like to take back a day with my father and tell him everything I didn't say while he was here.

I would like to take back all the days when I should have stood up for myself and the things that I believe in, and not let others influence me or the decisions I made with what they believed was right or wrong.

Of course I would like to re-do all the things that most people would choose, like studying more in school, not staying out so late, not arguing with my parents, and so on and so on.

We've all heard the saying, "Hindsight is 20/20," and "If I'd known then, what I know now," but have you ever really thought what would happen if you had known then, what you know now?

What would you do if a wand magically appeared and a voice from above echoed down, "Re-do and undo what you wish"? Could you choose. And if you finally narrow it down to one specific, why that one thing?

Think about it.

I know it's wishful thinking to hope that somehow we could get a chance to relive a day in our past, but why can't we take we take on tomorrow armed with the knowledge of what we would like to change of yesterday?

Let me give you a little advice someone was kind enough to give me.

Take what you would wish to change about yesterday and use it to build your foundation for tomorrow. The events of yesterday are the blocks we use to form the shape of our tomorrow. And with each passing day, the mortar of our morals will hold together the blocks of our yesterdays, allowing us to build the stairway of our souls. Whether up or down, the direction of your stairway depends solely on you.