Chasing the past, I stumbled into the future.

The line frames nostalgia as an active pursuit—“chasing the past”—that paradoxically propels the speaker forward. “Stumbled” suggests the future arrives not through deliberate planning but through accident, misstep, or unintended consequence. The quote captures a common human pattern: attempts to recover what is lost (a relationship, an earlier self, a vanished era) can catalyze change, forcing adaptation and opening unforeseen paths. Its compact antithesis (past vs. future) also implies that time cannot be reversed; the very act of looking back can reorient one’s trajectory, making the future something encountered rather than chosen.