The Importance of Revisiting

Taking the time to look back as we move forward

I miss photo albums. I still make a family photo album once a year because I like to revisit the years prior. Looking at old pictures and journals allows us to remember ourselves in a particular time and place. I always kick myself because when I went to college I got rid of all of my high school journals, and now I wonder what I would have learned or remembered about who I was then. There is a lot to be gained by looking back at our past and revisiting elements of it. a

home office

There will always be another new resource or book (I have a new workbook, The Drama Free Workbook coming out), but sometimes we would be best served to go back and reread a book rather than get a new one. When you revisit a book, you revisit yourself the time you last read it, and it helps you to learn about yourself. I love to reread books that I read in high school and college to see what I understand now that maybe I didn’t understand back then and how my perspective has changed. At different points in life, we are able to extract different things. 

Here is a list of books that are great to re-read (especially at the top of the year):

• Anything by Dr. Wayne Dyer, the father of self-help in the 70s (his stuff is timeless)

• My first book, Set Boundaries, Find Peace

• Atomic Habits, by James Clear

• Essentialism, by Greg McKeown

• The Lazy Genius Way, by Kendra Adachi

• The Four Agreements, by Don Miguel Ruiz

As we’re revisiting we can review old notebooks and journals. Personally, I am a notetaker. Before I know it, I have 5,000 notes on my phone and I’ve only looked at 20 in the last few months. I find all kinds of things in there. Rereading our own words can help us gain the clarity we need to set goals and intentions in the present. 

Revisiting also prompts us to clear things out. We can delete, declutter, and pare down things that are just taking up space. We can comb through the notes in our phones, the receipts in our wallets, the emails from over a decade ago, and the dozens of duplicates in our camera rolls, and decide what to part with and what holds some value. 

Every now and then there are some new wonderful tools or ideas that are phenomenal, but a lot of it is a remix. As we are acquiring new stuff, we need to take a look at what we already have. 

Journal Prompt

What is something in your life that you would like to revisit?

A Few Things That Caught My Attention This Week

• 7 Ways to Bring a Dead Friendship Back to Life, by Angela Haupt, in Time Magazine. 

• 9 Mental-Health Resolutions for 2024, According to Therapists, Angela Haupt, in Time Magazine

• The Real Meaning of Gatekeeping, by Ann Friedman in The Cut. 

• Walking in Celebration on the This Morning Walk podcast. You can listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you stream podcasts.

• 9 Ways to Improve Your Relationship in 2024, Catherine Pearson, in The New York Times