Regrets

Having regrets is something that is a part of life. To have regrets is to acknowledge the fact that our decisions could’ve been better, that some decisions took us down the wrong road or a road that was subpar compared to what we could’ve taken.

I’ve heard some say that they have no regrets because their decisions got them to where they are today. They might even add that if it weren’t for their mistakes, they wouldn’t be the person they are today, since they learned from their mistakes and grown as a person. However, just because someone can learn from their mistakes, it doesn’t mean that they should repeat them or that someone else should make them as well.

Having regrets can seem like someone is stuck in the past, dwelling on past decisions or decisions not taken (opportunities missed). But regrets can be viewed as a sort of timestamp: a marker in our lives that remind us of what we shouldn’t do again–of opportunities we shouldn’t pass up if they were to occur again.

Of course, we shouldn’t dwell on our regrets, nor try to fix them in our minds as if that would change the past. But we do need to come to terms with them so that we can learn from them, and so that we become more prudent with our decisions the next time around.