Recently I came across a dialog in a TV movie that had the protagonist say “sometimes you have to take one step backwards in order to move two steps forward”. I thought that was a clever flip on part of the dialog writer.
I am more used to one step forward and two steps backward treatments in my life, or at the least as I perceived my failures and setbacks. I was reminiscing how many times I too did take one step backward in order to move two steps forward and it turned out it was more than once. While as a platitude it may have its place in our lives, The most recent incident was in the last few years of my career in my penultimate job. I was pondering about the (mostly) emotional toll it took on me either during the decision phase to take the step backward, or during the phase where my life took a step backward. While the eventual two steps forward assuaged the pain greatly, it wrought havoc on my emotional well being. The effort of my entire support team (family and friends) was to channel my energies to bootstrap and prime my state of mind to be positive by encouraging me to keep the eye on the puzzle, I realized it was my battle alone and mine only to slay the dragon of that backward step.
The two steps forward in the above mentioned scenario was a substantial reward that would have a significant bearing upon the quality of my life after retirement. The one step backward stage continued for about 3 years or so. Those were certainly emotionally most miserable three years in my life. It was a kaleidoscope of “why me”, “what is that I did so terribly wrong”, and so on. I was certainly NOT feeling emotional dissonance. I was certainly “kvelling” about all those loved ones around me, and feeling and weltschmerz about myself. The contrariety was absolutely mind numbing and sucked life out of my existence. That was around the time I was diagnosed with venous hemangioma, resulting in hemi-chorea in the left side. The anti-psychotic medication I was taking for the symptoms added further misery.
The most “unreasonable” aspect of that time in my life was that there were no villains, no scheming co-workers, unreasonably demanding bosses etc. If anything, everyone was accommodating, considerate and understanding. So the irony is that I couldn’t even blame anyone for my misery except, of course me.
My recent physical experience of one step back, two steps forward was a hike to Mesquite Sand dunes in Death Valley, California. If you never climbed a steep side of a sand dune, you are in for an experience, especially if you are controlling type. 🙂 Every step you take, you slide back, and all you do is slide less than you climb. My progress was measured in inches both due to the sand and my ability or lack thereof, to walk on a slippery slope. The image below shows the steep angle we climbed as evinced by the foot prints at the bottom left corner of the image. The added challenge was that the climb was in dark, before dawn, and we were racing to reach top before Sunrise.
After what seemed like a deja vu of my stint at my penultimate job, I managed to get to the top and was surely rewarded with some great sights as I was rewarded at that job.
Often it was said that it is not the destination that matters, but it is the journey. A word of caution: watch out for what kind of journey you are embarking upon, in my case, some of those, I could very well have done without embarking upon them.
Here is wishing you all a welcoming summer in US/Europe and cooling showers elsewhere to provide you relief from sweltering heat.
