You can move back in time using this device we call "memory". Up and to the left - value grows as you consider earlier values. Up and to the right - value grows as you consider newer values. Yes considering newer values after older ones is a reasonable default but it's not completely redundant to specify that's what's meant.
It is only unintuitive if your mental representation of time flows to the right.
We all create a mental model of time at some point in our life, and then stick to it - often without ever talking about it to anyone.
But the representations vary substantially between people. Many people might have a timeline where the past is on the left and the future is on the right - maybe along the reading direction. But for some, future expands to the left. For others, future expands in front of them while the past is behind them (quite inconvenient).
It can make for a great party conversation to explore each others‘ timelines.
It's more like every point of view looks at the past. Which is also true if you look at your screen right now, it's just that you're looking at your screen some nanoseconds ago.
When you're moving back into the past, you're talking from your perspective about your perspective. But when you're talking about a deadline, you're talking from your perspective about a "stationary" event in the future. Since you are moving forward, but the deadline stays in place, relatively speaking the deadline moves towards you - so you push it back, in its reference frame, into your future.
If this sounds complicated, blame the fact that we use spatial intuitions for timekeeping. For instance, if you compare "step back" to "push back" in a spatial sense, they also mean opposite things, and for the same exact reason.
There can be a point in time where you can't go further back - all directions point to the future - in the same way that there's a point on Earth where you can't go further North - all directions point South.
I find that its easy to look back on memories and wish to go back. One day it clicked that I may look back on today and think the same thing. For me, the key is to try and be happy today, try not to look backwards and long for the impossible idea of revisiting those times, and try not to fear the future.
People mean that if you go back to the past knowing something you didn't know the first time around you would have the ability to make the "better" choice the second time around because of the new information.
I think it's natural to think about the past, this habit is all about priming your brain for positive thinking so when you do look back, you see the positive first rather than the negative.
At my current job I was introduced to the notion of 'past you' and 'future you'. I hadn't really thought about actions in those terms exactly, but the act of doing something today so that in the future when you come back to it you'll be in a better position, is the essence of the philosophy.
I have found that taking the time to rewrite the code that finally works into something that I can explain to myself in the future has paid dividends when I came back to it, and when I have not done that, we'll that can be annoying.
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