Say What?

There the words were.

"It's tough to predict the future, but it takes real guts to predict the past."

Say what?

Joel Stein writing in Time Magazine penned those words in his most recent editorial in the magazine.

I read them late last night and it made me wonder about the past. Standing on the doorstep of 2011, people are already predicting what the future will look like and are anxious to put the past behind them. Little attention seems to be given to reflecting on the past and what it might mean going forward.

Are lessons learned from past experiences formative for future moments?

Is history any reference point for determining what our unfolding future looks like?

To often I find myself trying to avoid history, tradition and forging ahead with life. The writer of the book of Ecclesiastes said, "there is nothing new under the sun."

Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás aka as George Santayana was a philosopher and writer in the first half of the twentieth century. Perhaps his most famous remark is one that is oft repeated at this time of year, especially by those who look forward to new starts.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."-George Santayana

Some have said the definition of insanity is "doing the same things over and over again and expecting a different result." I have seen and felt the results of that.

How do we make sure that our New Year's Resolutions are more than a "to do" for the first two weeks of January?

One way is to "remember the past" and that is far different from "dwelling on the past."

"Every day I review the ways he works, I try not to miss a trick. I feel put back together, and I'm watching my step. God rewrote the text of my life when I opened the book of my heart to his eyes." II Samuel 22:21 The Message

So, I choose to review the ways He works. I choose the allow the Master Writer to re-write the text of my life. I choose the open the book of my heart to His eyes.

Call'em New Year's Resolutions if you want, but that's my story (er' His Story) and I'm stickin' to it.