Progress means getting nearer to the place you want to be. And if you have taken a wrong turning, then going forward does not get you any nearer.

Matt Haig shares this quote from C.S. Lewis in Notes on a Nervous Planet. He follows it with this insight of his own:

Forward momentum, on an individual or social level, is not automatically good simply because it is forward momentum… progress might mean doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road.

It seems to me that often our egos get in the way of these about-turns. We’re too fragile to admit, to ourselves as much as anyone else, that we made a mistake and so we just keep ploughing forward.

If we can get beyond that, and check in with ourselves on a regular basis to ask if we’re still heading in the right direction, then maybe we can avoid going too far along the wrong roads.

#progress #change #mistakes #ego