Step one is the hardest: how to recognize a bridge worth maintaining. In my experience bridges don't burn or even catch fire, they fall apart due to neglect. Only after they have fallen completely apart do you recognize there even was a bridge and that it traversed a deep canyon.
A deep canyon that widens with every step you take away from it, or for that matter even closer to it. For standing at the edge and wishing for a way back does not rebuild the bridge. Reconstruction requires thought, a plan, and a list of materials. Then you must drive to the hardware store, go up and down aisles until you find everything, and buy some tools too that you don't have or can't remember where you put them. Then when you discover you can't fit all the supplies in your car, you have to inquire about renting a truck by the hour, loading it, driving it back to where the gaping wound in your past lies, off-loading the tools and materials, driving back and picking up your car that was left sitting in the parking lot.
If then you can get back to the site of your materials and tools without stopping at McDonald's for a McCafe with chocolate syrup and whipped topping to console yourself about how much work this is, and then tell yourself that really, you can live with this big canyon in the landscape of your life, it's ok, you'll just navigate around it, well then, you have more perseverance and focus than I.
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