I like to believe that documenting our thoughts and life events as and when they happen, is one of the nicest things we can offer our future selves. Over the years, it can be easy to remember days, events, or even phases of our lives, with people who might or might not still be there. Yet what can bring back the same sincere smiles or trigger the same tender tears, is being able to remember the precise feelings we’ve experienced that we might no longer have access to, and that no one can remind us of better than ourselves.

If you happen to watch a video of yourself as a young carefree child, the innocence and tranquility you‘d experience can be more powerful than solely remembering the old days. If you later get to listen to a voice memo you might’ve managed to record during a hardship or a test that God sent your way, you‘d probably feel more grateful for getting over it upon hearing your own voice expressing it, than if you only depend on your memory of how things felt. The words and thoughts you can get on paper as you first encounter a certain someone, and your descriptions of the feelings they activate inside you as they make their way into your life, can make up for your last memory of them that might otherwise turn you bitter about the whole relationship, and permanently erase its prettiest parts.

It’s true it can sometimes be painful to revisit old pieces of yourself, and yet the sense of satisfaction that often follows realizing you’ve survived it all can sometimes make up for that. Realizing you’ve gone so far, and accepting you still have a long way to go. Looking back at the little pieces that were once all you thought would forever define you. Literally watching yourself grow. It makes a hell of a difference.

So here’s a very much needed reminder to myself: please remember to take more pictures, record more videos, and fill in more notebooks. Make sure you document things in whatever way that feels comfortable. Keep them somewhere safe. For you never know when your future self would need a quick peek into them.

February 1, 2020