Why looking backwards matters
When we think about journeys, our mind jumps forwards to - the destination, the next step, the horizon. The language of progression is almost entirely forward-facing – ‘keep going,’ ‘move on,’ ‘you’re nearly there.’ Yet history, human psychology, and plain common sense tells us that sometimes the most important thing you can do while moving forwards…is to pause and look back.
Looking backwards is not the same as getting stuck in the past. Done well, it is reflection - the art of using your past experiences for insight, learning, and perspective is aa essential to growth as oxygen is to life. Without it, we risk walking in circles or missing the meaning in our own existence.
Navigation requires landmarks
If you’ve ever navigated in an unfamiliar landscape, you’ll know what I mean - you move forwards, spotting a tree or a rock formation as a marker. But those that are more experienced will also turnaround from time to time, to look at the trail from the opposite direction. Why? Because you’ll need to know the way back and landscapes look a lot different in reverse.
This metaphor extends beautifully into life’s journey:-
- In careers, looking back at where you started can keep you grounded and help you notice whether your current career path aligns with your original motivation
- In relationships, reflection helps you see patterns - both the ones you want to repeat and the ones you want to break.
If you never glance backwards, you risk becoming disoriented, forgetting where you came from, and lose the ability to recognise when and where you’ve gone off track.
Reflection turns experience into wisdom
Experience alone does not guarantee growth. People can repeat the same mistakes for decades without learning a thing - unless they pause and reflect.
Looking backwards allows you to:-
- Identify what worked well and why
- Recognise mistakes without self-punishment
- See how challenges shaped your resilience.
Think of life as a laboratory - you run experiments (actions), gather data (results), and then… you analyse. If you skip the analysis phase, you might as well be working in the dark. Looking back is the analysis - the stage where raw experience transforms into usable knowledge.
Gratitude is backwards facing
Gratitude is one of the most powerful emotional tools we have for maintaining happiness, and it’s inherently retrospective as you can’t be grateful for something you haven’t yet experienced.
When you look backwards on your journey:-
- You see how far you’ve come
- You notice the small victories that were invisible whilst you were in the struggle
- You remember the people who helped you along the way.
Without those backward glances, your sense of progress can flatten out, leaving you feeling like you’re endlessly climbing with no summit in sight.
The danger of purely forward obsession
Forward-only thinking carries risks:-
- Burnout: If you never stop to reflect, every achievement feels like just another box ticked before the next goal. There’s no celebration, only constant striving
- Narrowed vision: You might get so fixated on your next milestone that you fail to see better opportunities emerging behind you - ones that require looping back
- Reinforcing mistakes: Without looking back to evaluate, you might keep using strategies that don’t work simply because you haven’t paused to question them.
Life isn’t a high-speed train where the only acceptable view is through the front window.
Memory as a compass
Memory isn’t just a storage system - it’s a compass.
When you reflect on your past, you remember:-
- Your original motivations and values
- The promises you made to yourself
- The lessons you’ve already paid for in time, money, or heartache.
This is critical for course correction. Imagine you set out to sail toward a distant island, but months later, you find yourself adrift. Without looking back to your original coordinates, you have no way of knowing how far you’ve strayed - or whether you’re even still headed in the right ocean.
The role of storytelling
Humans are storytelling creatures. We make meaning by connecting events into narratives. Looking backwards is how we piece together those narratives:-
- We identify turning points - moments that changed everything.
- We recognise recurring themes - patterns in our choices and outcomes
- We see character development in our own transformation over time.
Without looking back, we live fragmentally, reacting moment-to-moment without ever understanding the arc of our journey.
The emotional calibration point
Our emotional state often depends less on where we are and more on where we think we are relative to where we started.
Looking back can provide two essential kinds of calibration:-
- Relief and pride - when you see you’ve made significant progress
- Reality checks - when you notice you’re repeating old cycles.
Both are valuable. They either boost your confidence or alert you to make more changes.
Examples from history and nature
- History: Civilisations that study their own past avoid repeating catastrophic mistakes; those that ignore history often relive them
- Nature: Migratory animals rely on memory of past routes. Even when instinct drives them forward, their path is shaped by the patterns of previous journeys
- Art and Science: Innovation often comes from revisiting older ideas and viewing them from a new angle, rather than discarding them entirely.
Looking Back Without Getting Stuck
Of course, there’s a balance. Too much backward focus can trap you in nostalgia or regret. The key is to treat looking back like checking your mirrors whilst driving:
- Do it regularly
- Use the information to navigate wisely
- Then return your gaze forwards, informed but not imprisoned by the past.
A Practical Framework for Backward Looking
Here’s a simple approach you can apply to any kind of journey:-
1. Pause: Create intentional moments for reflection (weekly, monthly, yearly)
2. Review: Ask yourself, ‘What have I learned? What worked? What didn’t?’
3. Acknowledge: Celebrate wins and name your helpers
4. Extract: Identify specific lessons you can use going forwards
5. Integrate: Adjust your plans with those lessons in mind
6. Release: Let go of what no longer serves you and continue onwards.
The Spiritual Dimension
Many philosophies and religions emphasise looking backwards as part of growth:-
- In Buddhism, reflection on past actions helps cultivate mindfulness and compassion
- In Christianity, remembering past deliverances is a source of faith for future trials
- In Stoicism, reviewing the day’s events is a daily practice for improving character.
This isn’t just sentimentality; it’s a disciplined way of aligning your present with your deeper values.
The ultimate reason - Identity
Perhaps the most profound reason to look backwards is that it’s the only way to know who you are.
You are not defined only by your goals or current circumstances - you are a continuity of experiences, decisions, triumphs, and mistakes. Looking back lets you:-
- See the bassline in your life
- Understand your resilience
- Appreciate that your current self is the product of many former selves who fought to get you here.
Without that awareness, your journey becomes a blur - just motion, without meaning.
Onwards travel
A journey without backward glances is like reading a book by only turning forward, never flipping back to recall a character’s name or a crucial detail. You might reach the end faster, but you’ll miss the richness of the story. Looking back is not a distraction from progress - it’s part of how we make progress real. It transforms movement into growth, destinations into stories, and milestones into meaning.
1,220 Marathons - 289 Ultras - 18 MDS - 9 GWR - 1 Direction
