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REFLECTIONS

The Value of Going Back to Go Forward

Julio Vincent Gambuto
5 min readJul 21, 2023
Photo by Kelli McClintock on Unsplash

I write today from a cafe on my college campus. I haven’t sat in this chair or in this square for 23 years. I was a member of the Class of 2000. Our twenty-year reunion was, well…yep, 2020. It went down with the ship, like countless graduation ceremonies, proms, events — and businesses and marriages. In the storm of it all, a college reunion wasn’t a cancellation to complain about. Our class secretary did her best to rally the troops online, so we could see the faces, read the names, and raise a glass from a safe distance. It was a valiant effort to put us all in the mind space of who we were to one another two decades ago. Being here today, I am reminded that the mind space is much easier and more meaningful when you can return to the physical space.

For the last 20 years, and for countless before I am sure, our focus has been squarely on the future — “our” meaning you and me, us, society, the collective we. We are living through the largest technological revolution since the coal-fired steam engine kicked off the Industrial Revolution. To sell that technology so fast and furiously, we were first sold a very sexy story that tech equals the future. That narrative has re-pointed our collective focus on all that will come. Eyes on the road ahead. What has atrophied in that process is our understanding of the value of the past, of…

Julio Vincent Gambuto
Julio Vincent Gambuto

Written by Julio Vincent Gambuto

Author + Moviemaker. Back to socials 2x/week. Connect at juliovincent.com.

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