thoughts.

"life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forward." - Soren Kierkegaard.

i stumbled upon this quote recently and it really made me think.
we wake up each day not knowing what lies ahead of us. even if we think we have it all planned out, everything remains a mystery. plans change, life goes by without us even realizing it, and things surprise us all the time.

the only way that we can face life is to live in the present and hope for a positive future. we can't dwell on the past or focus too heavily on the future. life is really an experience in forward motion...somedays it feels like there's constantly something tripping us up, but we continue forward.

i wonder if someday when i'm very old and my life is just about over, i'll be able to look back on all of the experience throughout my life and see the reason behind them all. "life can only be understood backwards.." will i see why i did certain things? or the consequences of not doing things? i like to think that it will all make sense in the end. i'd like to believe that every decision and i've made and every person i've met so far has made an impact on the person i am today. i'll have many more experiences and meet many more people and i'm sure that they will all affect me too. someday i think i'll understand the things that have caused me pain, the struggles i have had, the happiness i've experienced and knowing that gives me a lot of comfort.