"That Was When I Was Blooming"

This whole interview with Yoshiro Kimura is a valuable perspective on creating over time, but I particularly appreciate this bit:

Interviewer: I see. There are a lot of RPGs and games that follow standard methods and take the safe route, but you tried to do something different which I think a lot of people enjoy and respect. Maybe that’s another reason it became a cult classic.

Kimura: “When making the game we had that philosophy: the game should play like this, the story should be like this. Of course now I say something was wrong about the game, I can say that. But at the same time I can sense and see the heart in the game from young Kimura and others fighting against reality. After I escaped Square, thinking I can’t make games for this company, I almost quit making games. I was thinking I should go back to drawing and writing stories. But my friends said “come join us” and I suddenly had the chance to write the story for Moon. That was when I was blooming, so I can not deny this experience. I have to recognize both the good parts and bad parts and respect young Kimura.”

"I have to recognize both the good parts and the bad parts and respect young [me]," is something I want to internalize. It's too easy for me to look back on past experiences and invalidate them — and myself — by focusing on what I wish now had gone differently. I don't agree with people who say, "I wouldn't change a thing; everything that's happened made me who I am today!" because that implies you like who you are. I don't. I'm working to accept myself, but I'm also working to become a version of myself that I'd rather be. BUT that doesn't mean you need to go around trash-talking your past self and work (unless you've harmed people along the way, that's something to feel bad about, but in a way that drives you to apologize and atone if possible). I can tend to talk very negatively to myself about my past, even things that in another mood I might be grateful for or proud of.

Even if I would change things now, all I can do about the past is accept it, and respect that I made the decisions I could with the tools and conditions at hand. Even when I don't think I did my best, I did what I could. I want to do better in the future, and will always be aiming higher, but when looking back I want to say, "That was when I was blooming, so I can not deny this experience."