Songfacts®:

• Jason Crosby is best known as a sideman, playing a number of instruments (mostly violin and keyboards) for a wide range of artists, Phil Lesh, Eric Clapton and Susan Tedeschi among them. In 2017, he released a solo album, Cryptologic, with "Final Step" as the first single.
  
  He wrote the song in Maui strumming a ukulele he borrowed from a friend. When he returned to Stinson Beach, California, he recorded the song, again looking over the Pacific Ocean.
• The song deals with Crosby's journey through life. "I've had a wild ride over the last 25 years," he said in a Songfacts interview. "From a career standpoint, it's been unbelievable, but sometimes when you're so busy, you just focus on internal things. I feel like this record represents some things from the past, some demons that I've overcome and some redemption and results from hard work.
  
  I've had my brush with rock and roll lifestyle and there's ways to survive it and there's moderation and all those things to consider. I had some dark years, but I've come out of it nicely.
  
  I think, sometimes, the shadows, the ghost of myself, is thinking back to what I could have become if I'd made better decisions, but I'm happy where I am now."