Regret

What a horrible thing regret is, absolutely horrible.  It makes you feel so helpless, powerless and filled with despair.  Why? Because there is absolutely nothing you can do about the past and how you have behaved, what you have done or said, what you have not done or not said, etc.  How do you deal with regret?  The short answer is to acknowledge it, accept it, and move on.  Really, what else can you do?

I guess it comes with age, the whole concept of looking back at your life, analyzing it to death, dwelling over every single decision you've ever made and picking at every road you have chosen and all the ones not chosen at the crossroads of your life.  

I myself acknowledge the right decisions and feel grateful for the correct roads that I've taken, but the dwelling and obsessing is mainly over the wrong decisions and the wrong roads taken.  Why do we do that to ourselves? The regret over the bad overweighs the gratitude over the good.  Too many points are taken away for the wrong doings and not enough given for the jobs done right.   

Regret is the worst feeling because it comes with blame, blame of oneself.  That's why it eats at you and eats at you until you are drained and all that is left is self doubt and perhaps even self hate.  

Sometimes its as simple as I should have ordered the hamburger instead of the pizza or  I should not have worn these shoes to this event or why did I just waste my time on this shit movie.  Sometimes its a bit heavier like I should not have let her treat me that way or why didn't I speak up when I should have or I wish I hadn't taken that time for granted.  Then it becomes heavier and heavier like I should have been a better daughter or I should have choses a different career or I should have should have should have should have.  Should have, could have, would have, the past is gone, that chance is gone, all that's left is regret.

You may not get a chance now to speak up when you should have many years back or go back and not take that time for granted, but on the other hand now you know to order the pizza instead of the hamburger, wear different shoes next time, or even become a better daughter if you still have a chance.  I guess what comes out of this is that perhaps regret gives way to learning and adjusting and changing where and when possible.

Perhaps most of our regrets are from early on in our life because we were inexperienced and didn't know any better (I mean how could you know? Listen to your elders? oh please!) As time goes by new regrets over big things become less and less because we have learned and adjusted and even grown.  Therefore we make less mistakes.  We end up actually making the right decisions more and more.  Yes, the daily low level regrets still exist such as I should have eased up on the botox a bit or maybe I should not have watched nine episodes of Outlander in one day (sometimes we just never learn).  But regret over major decisions and just bad behavior or which road to take become less and less.  This is due to wisdom and experience.  

So if it makes you feel any better, know that you have already made your biggest mistakes and have already gone down the wrong roads a long time ago.  It's less likely that you'd repeat it or find yourself picking the wrong roads to go down on again.  Your new mistakes will probably be too small to make you filled with regret and dwell and obsess over it later.  As for me, I plead young age and ignorance for all of my early mistakes and the regrets that come from it.  However, as for my new mistakes I can only pledge insanity because as we all know, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.