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If you could go back and change one thing in your life, what would it be?

I think about this a lot. I know it’s kinda silly, since it’s impossible to literally act on it, but that’s what I do — waste countless brain energy working and analyzing scenarios with no basis in reality. I think it’s an anxiety thing.

Every little moment affects all moments that come later, and it doesn’t take much to alter your course … in my humble opinion.

I used to come up with instant-gratification answers with a smaller sphere of influence, such as “I never would have taken that crap job in Kansas City” or “I never would have called [evil, alcoholic, redneck ex-girlfriend] back after our first date.” Then I expanded a little, with answers such as “I would have rejected that first copy-editing job and waited for a writing gig, which naturally would have kept from away from the evil Kansas City job” or “I would have bolted sooner from my first unhealthy relationship, in college, which would have strengthened my skill at avoiding bad relationships.”

Now I know that if I could go back and change one thing earlier in my life, it would be to force myself to stick to writing journals at a young age. I’ve never kept a daily journal over a long period of time, and I feel robbed because of it.

I first tried keeping one when I was in junior high, because we were forced to by our English teacher (who read and graded them). Basically all I did was ramble about what a crush I had on one of the cheerleaders, who our English teacher coached, hoping she would intervene and set us up. It wasn’t a very soul-searching piece of work.

I tried again when I got to college because I was so damn excited to be there. I kept it up pretty well the summer after my first year, but it once again faded away. Since then I’ve tried unsuccessfully to get back into the habit, only to slack off after a week or two and pick it up again months later, cursing myself for letting time slip by. I still do not write in a journal every day.

On one level, I want all those memories. There are so many little things we forget as we age, and I wish I could remember them. I know the mind plays tricks on you and alters past moments — sometimes making them seem worse, but usually making them seem better than they were. If I had a written record of each moment, I could go back and remember what truly happened and exactly how I felt at the time. I want to know if all these great summers in high school were really as great as I remember, or what I was thinking after my first college date. I want to see, on paper, how my outlook has evolved over the years.

On a different level, I wish I had the 20 years of writing practice. As with anything else, the more you write the more comfortable you are doing it and the easier the words come. I know how to write now, but I can struggle for an hour filling two or three pages in my journal, drawing a blank when I try to think of what to write about. If I had been doing this every night for two decades, it would be instinctual and less agonizing. I believe that would have lead to me writing for a living now, instead of editing.

I’m one of those people who gets anxious about doing something until he actually does it, then realizes it was easy, fun and that I was a moron for worrying so much. But if I don’t do it again for a while I forget that easy, fun part. I want to be a writer — always have. But I took an editing position when I needed a job and got stuck in the career, slowly putting more time between me and the writing of anything for publication (articles, essays, poems, etc.). The more that gap grows, the more insecure I grow about my abilities to do it again.

On a broader level, I think being more in touch with my experiences and having an easier time expressing myself writtenly — not to mention being in a situation where I write for a living — would leave me feeling more secure in general and possibly even more aware of what it is I want out of Life. Feeling more secure would lead to taking more risks, which usually means having more fun. When you spend your life doing what you think you were meant to do you feel better. Usually.

Sometimes it bothers me to obsess over the “change the past” scenario because I know it’s an impossible feat. I realize many people daydream about “what if” and how things might be different for them, but it occupies my thoughts way more than it should. But then again, I kinda hope it will propel me to better mold the future.