The Punishment Of My Past Creations

What the hell was I thinking back then?

Uncovering My Old Work

One day, I was having a good old time organizing my Google Drive files, when I stumbled upon my schoolwork folder.

Well, I only have like five folders total, so it was always visible.

For some reason, I felt compelled to open it up and take a look at my old assignments. In particular, one of my essays I wrote in my freshman year in a college English course.

I opened it up and…

What the living hell is this?

I immediately felt the urge to time-travel back a couple of years and beat the living crap out of my old self. Just reading the title alone made me want to throw myself from a cliff from how cringey it was.

Did I really think and write like this only a few years ago?

This realization was only made worse when I started to think about what others must have thought at the time.

“Chill with that edge, buddy.”
“He obviously has no idea what the real world is like.”
“These are the worst arguments I have ever seen in my life.”

I couldn’t even read more than a few sentences before I had to close out the document. It was that embarrassing. I wanted to completely disintegrate that essay into dust.

That’s Not It

That essay was by no means the only work I’ve created that has made me want to punch my face in. I began to ruminate on all of the other things I’ve worked on throughout my two or so decades of life.

In high school, I took part in a video production course. We had to make a ton of videos based on the prompts that our teacher provided. Some of the scenarios I had to act out were executed awkwardly, to say the least.

It’s difficult to describe some of the things I had to do.

I was mostly a cameraman but still participated in the storyboarding and some characters.

And while I can’t really describe the scenarios in detail, you can probably guess that my acting nor storytelling wasn’t exactly the best in high school.

A phone addiction PSA. A music video. Some sort of “action” film.

Just imagine how a high schooler would execute those.

I remember every time, we would have to play our videos in front of the entire class. And upon doing so, I would cringe massively every time.

Mistakes in the editing, my terrible delivery, and even the scenario I thought of by itself garnered so much embarrassment for me.

“You really like teddy bears...don’t you?”
(That’s an actual line in a video.)

The Urge To Delete

There are many more things that evoke that feeling. Other old creative writing, and logos I’ve designed in the past. The list goes on and on.

There are so many creations I regret ever starting.

Sometimes, like in the case of my old essays, my curiosity will get the better of me. I take a look, only to feel that punch in the gut, and immediately close it.

WHAT THE HELL IS THIS

Admittedly, I even do this with the first game I made and released publicly. It was an intermittent four years of learning new things I had never done before.

Even knowing how much time and money I’ve invested into it, I still have that urge to just remove it from circulation entirely.

I sometimes think my past works are the worst thing to ever disgrace the eyes of mankind. It can be very difficult to resist that temptation.

After all, I’m just a few clicks away from stopping this feeling of shame and embarrassment that comes from realizing… maybe my work wasn’t as good as I thought.

However, despite how much it makes me suffer, I refuse to let myself press that button.

Despite what I felt, there were people who enjoyed what I made. From professors to complete internet strangers. To delete would mean once again, I am placing my own feelings above everyone else’s.

I may fear being judged or being made fun of. But I have to keep reminding myself, once again, that no one cares for the most part.

My feelings aren’t that important.

A Broader Perspective

It’s that dissonance between what I thought then, and what I think now that’s so uncomfortable.

Back then, I had much less experience with everything. From writing, story direction, workflows, editing, and all that. Not only that, but I had much less perspective in my life.

It’s not a surprise that over the past couple of years, I have gotten better at not only working but also thinking critically. I’m not the best I’ll ever be, but I’ve improved since then.

However, I then look at my work from before, and view them from the lens of today. With more experience, I re-examine everything and see all of the flaws and errors in what I had created before.

That dissonance makes me feel super uncomfortable.

If only I had done this, instead of that…
How the heck did I think this was a good idea?
I should have done that.

Of course, it’s easy to say what I could have done better in hindsight. But there was no way I could have known that at the time. It took many years of mistakes and experiences to get to this point.

That applies to everything I’ve done in my life. Programming, music, art, writing, and even ideas and values. All of that was a continuous journey of learning and improvement that’s still ongoing.

That journey isn’t going to end any time soon.

So I try and tell myself that while these past works invoke a strong feeling of regret, it is really indicative of how much I’ve moved further since then. They had to happen for today to be possible.

It would be way more concerning if what I create today is just as good or bad as what I created years back. That would mean I’ve been stagnating this entire time.

This embarrassment should not be a hindrance to continuing.
In fact, it should be a motivator.

Now that I’m aware of what shortcomings I had in my prior work, I am able to address those issues in my next endeavors. And with that, I hope those projects will be better than anything I’ve done before.

Conclusion

A few years from now, I will look back at my second game project and compare it to my third. And I might dislike it for how much worse it is, compared to my latest work.

I will re-read all of the articles I’ve written on Medium. I might find some ideas I no longer agree with. And in response, my face might scrunch up in agonizing pain.

But through this realization, I hope I’ll become a better writer. A better programmer, and a better musician. A better artist and communicator.

Overall, I hope I’ll become a better version of myself.

Only through enduring the pain of revelation will I be able to do so.
And so I’ll do my best to work with it until I’ve done something I’ll be proud of.

That is the punishment, but also the reward of my past creations.