In 2020 I’m answering a list of 52 journal questions. Read about it here.
Write down one regret.
I don’t like to think about regrets, after all, regrets are really wishing you’d made another choice.
When you make a choice, you are making it based on the information you have on hand. That can come from your emotion at the time, previous experiences, what you are wanting in the future, the pros and cons as you see them and the opinions of others around you.
It doesn’t mean it turns out it is the right decision. Only time will tell if that was the case. But you can’t go back and change it, and chances are, put in that exact position again, you will make the same decision.
That’s the problem with choices, you never know what the future holds so can’t add that to the scales when choosing.
I try very hard to make a decision and to not look back. That’s not to say there aren’t choices I wish I hadn’t made – far from it. But if I hadn’t made those choices I wouldn’t be the person I am today, with the family I have. I wouldn’t change that choice for anything.
![Amazon.com: Sliding Doors [DVD] [1997]: Movies & TV](https://i0.wp.com/images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/717zq76kZ2L._SY445_.jpg?resize=176%2C254&ssl=1)
Have you ever seen the movie Sliding Doors? It resonated with me and I think about it quite a lot, because that’s how I view choices now. Sometimes it is the tiniest choice that can make the biggest difference in the path you go down. And sometimes you don’t even know you’ve made a choice.
And you don’t actually know if the other choice would have turned out any better. It may have proven even worse than the one you made.
Now when I worry about a choice I think of it as a Sliding Doors moment, and it makes it easier to live with my decision (watch the movie if you get the chance).
So I try not to live with regret. I think I’m happier for it.
What about you, do you have something you regret?
June 13, 2020 at 1:00 am
Agree, 100%. Now to implement!
June 17, 2020 at 7:17 am
Haha, yeah, the implementation can be problematic at times.
June 13, 2020 at 1:20 am
I’ve never heard of that movie, but now I’m intrigued.
I’m a firm believer in no regrets. As callous as that might sound, it really isn’t. Like you, I find myself with plenty of decisions I’ve made that I wish I hadn’t. But then I think about even the most shallow version of the alternate timeline if I’d made a different decision—and realize I wouldn’t be who I am now, I might not have ever met my husband, and life might look vastly different.
If we can’t change the choices we’ve made in the past, then there’s no sense in living in the land of regrets. What we can do is learn from those less-than-stellar choices and move on.
June 17, 2020 at 7:18 am
Totally agree, Lynda. The best thing to do is to learn from our past so we don’t make mistakes in the future.
June 13, 2020 at 6:16 am
Oh yes, I saw Sliding Doors in the theater. I found it interesting that the better choice led to the worse outcome. Although, it didn’t seem like that at the beginning. Probably time for a rewatch.
June 17, 2020 at 7:21 am
That’s one of the things I think that made it really resonate for me. Because a tiny, seemingly innocuous choice had such a profound consequence. And when you look back at your own choices, you can’t tell how the other choice would have played out – it might not have been as rosy as you think.
June 14, 2020 at 11:28 pm
I haven’t seen that movie for a long time, but I do sometimes think about how small choices can make differences that aren’t apparent at the time. I do have a few regrets, but it helps to consider how they were decisions made with the information at hand.
June 17, 2020 at 7:27 am
It’s really easy to forget we make decisions with limited information. Once we’ve made the decision, we see how it plays out – and that’s when regret can rear its head. But we didn’t have that information before so…