Traveling Into the Past and Present Theory by PimpMyTheory

I was thinking about the time travel aspect of the Lost show and had a few observations. When the losties experienced the flashes, they were sent in the past. They moved forward and backward during the flashes, but it seemed like they never flashed beyond the original present time they started from. When Locke moved the wheel, he was sent about 3 years into the future. I am not sure, but wasn't Ben also sent into the future when he turned the wheel. Wasn't he positioned in the Middle East around the time Sayid's wife's funeral was taking place. Why is that?

My second observation was the wheel itself. When Locke and Ben turned the wheel and was placed in the future, they turned the wheel clockwise similar to a clock face. I wonder if they would have been placed in the past if they had turned the clock counterclockwise. Before Locke turned the wheel, the wheel was rotating quickly clockwise and counterclockwise which may have been the reason for the past flashes and future flashes.

My last observation is the purpose of a leader for the others. We don't know who the others are, but apparently, they need a leader. What if the purpose of the leader was to prep up a person to be sent into the past. We have been talking about time loops and variations about the loop. Maybe a person that is prepped as how to handle the people in conjunction to the island is needed to fulfill each loop. What if Jacob is a leader of the others that was sent back into the past to change things. Maybe the others are the past leaders that eventually made it back to the island. Lets say that if you were sent to the future, like locke, you could be killed, but if you were sent to the past, you couldn't be killed until you reached the time/year that you were sent back. Maybe the others are people from the future sent back to help make changes and they made it back to the island or were on the island all along.