Forgive Yourself for the Years. Then Stop Counting Them.
There’s a stretch of about ten years I used to think of as lost. Not dramatically; I was working, raising a family, getting by. But I wasn’t building anything, I wasn’t learning, and I was making the same small mistakes on a loop. When I finally woke up, the first thing I did was the arithmetic. Ten years. What I’d have now if I’d started then. Who I’d be.
I did that arithmetic most mornings for about two years. It was the most useless thing I did in that period, and I did it with real dedication.
What the counting actually does
It feels like accountability. It’s actually a way of staying in the old years without having to live in the new ones. Every morning spent calculating what the lost decade cost is a morning not spent on the one that’s available. The regret pretends to be motivation and functions as a brake. I know this because the years I did the most counting were the years I made the least progress.
You didn’t have what you have now
This is the thing the arithmetic leaves out. The man who wasted the decade didn’t know what I know. He hadn’t had the experiences that taught it. He wasn’t lazy or stupid; he was earlier. Judging him by what I learned afterward is like being angry at a child for not knowing algebra. The decade wasn’t wasted so much as it was tuition, paid at a rate I’d never agree to now, for lessons I couldn’t have got any other way.
The forgiveness is practical
Not a feeling you wait for. A decision, made once and then re-made when the counting starts again. “That’s done. He did his best with what he had. The question is what I do today.” Said out loud if necessary. It feels hollow the first few times. It stops feeling hollow around the time the mornings start going to work instead of to arithmetic.
Use the years instead of mourning them
Everything in those ten years is material now. The mistakes are the clearest lessons I have. The patterns I ran are the ones I can spot instantly in other people and help them with. The book I eventually wrote is largely about what that decade cost and why, which means the decade is in it, working, paying something back. Lost years are only lost if you refuse to spend them a second time, as experience.
The comparison that matters
Not you versus the you who started earlier. That person doesn’t exist and never will. You versus the you who keeps counting and never starts. That one’s real, and you can see him clearly, because you were him last year. The only race is against him.
Set a date for the last count
If you must do the arithmetic, do it once more, thoroughly, on paper. Write what it cost. Write what it taught. Then write the date and close the book. When the counting starts again, and it will, you point at the page: already done, nothing new to add. That trick retired a two-year habit in a month.
Today
Whatever years you’ve been counting, do the last count. Write what they taught. Forgive the person who was earlier. Then spend this morning on the decade you actually have.
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