Hitting the Back Space Button

I was sitting on the floor in the sun room doing my normal morning routine of checking my email, getting updates from my virtual life - facebook, and sipping my second cup of coffee when in walks Abby. She's a curious little girl, and I could about guess what she was going to say. "Whatcha doing?" She asked as she watched me hunched over my computer hammering out an email. I didn't answer right away, so she continues to observe and blurts out, "You hit the back space button a lot."

What? I thought I got away from all being critiqued on my keyboarding skills when I left primary school! Before I said anything, I stopped and did a insta-reflect (reflect on a situation as it happening) then said, "You know what? I do, don't I?" But I was thinking about it in a different sense...

Its easy, right? As you're typing away, you make a mistake, no big deal. Hit the back space button and its like it never happened, nobody knows, because it is completely erased. Think of the final product of a report or paper. Its clean, free of error, and in perfect state. You are proud and happy to hand it in or show it off. Nobody knows how many times you had to hit the back space button to get to that final draft.

Wouldn't it be nice if it was like that in real life? That the bad decisions or mistakes we make were totally wiped away by a simple tap of the back space key? It could never work like that. How could we ever learn from our mistakes if all it took was quick tap of the back space button? Even insta-reflect can't work that fast.

Wouldn't it be nice if we treated everyone as though they were the final draft? Forgot about the mistakes they made and just took them for what they were, right then and there? To not dwell on they're past, but because they have grown and learned from hitting the back space button. And from all that are at the most perfect state they can be at that very moment.

I don't think we are ever supposed to be at the final draft stage of who we are. People continuously change and we have to allow them to do that. New people will join our journey through life, and some will take a different path. Appreciate what you have with them in that moment.