At the park yesterday morning, parts of the paved path were damp. It didn’t seem that wet, not wet enough that a runner’s shoe would leave a trail of footprints, but it was. Perhaps because I had not yet achieved sufficient caffeine intake for the morning, it felt like a revelation that your footprint trail is always behind you. In fact, your footprints are no predictor of where you will go next. You could run or walk for a mile in one direction, and with the next step you could veer to the right or left.

It’s easy enough to get discouraged by the past, to believe that things will always remain the same. At least it is for me. But we’re not limited by our footprint trail. Turns out where we’ve been doesn’t dictate where we’ll go.