Journal 3/8/15

Today I will be answering the blog prompt, "What sort of forces drive people to return to the past, or "repeat the past", as Gatsby famously put it?"

I believe that what would cause a person to return back to their past or any type of past whether it be theirs or not, would be if they were in a form of desperation, or if they were in the need of answers.  I believe that if an individual was looking for a type of guidance, for an example if congress was looking for a way to solve an issue, they would look to history.  They would look to "their past" (America's past) to see how the government handled a similar or the same issue.  I believe that they would look to it and if it seemed like a success, they would find a way that they could apply the same method to the issue that they themselves see in front of them; and if the strategy appeared as a failure in history, the congress would then understand there is a method which they must look at and acknowledge that if it has been flawed in the past it could also be flawed again.  In general, I feel like a person finds the obligation to look into the past, when they have the need for guidance or counsel.

I believe that one other thing that could cause a person to return to the past is if they have a regret.  If an individual made a mistake in their life, they might often repeatedly look back to the mistake and think of ways they could fix it.

Also, sometimes if an individual is living "poorly", you could say, the person tends to look back at the past.  What I intend to say here, is when people say that an individual is "stuck in the past" when someone repeatedly wants to "live the past" because it was a time that was better than the time that they are currently living in.