Regrets . . . or lessons learned?

Regrets or lessons learned

Tim Connor

Regret can have a significant negative impact on every aspect of your future – your career, relationships, health and even your happiness and why?  Well for starters it keeps you stuck in the past, something that you can’t do anything about.  But just as important it can have a major negative impact on your present and your future.  Basically, regret is how we choose to define the past - decisions, actions, outcomes, experiences and even people in our life.

Another way to view these decisions, circumstances and the rest is to see them as lessons learned.  The only problem with this approach is you must do some “inner work” to discover what the learning could be or have been. But let me get back to that in a minute or so.

Let me give you just three quick examples of where regret can dramatically impact the rest of your life.

First – in your health – Let’s say in an earlier part of your life you were a smoker, druggie or ate like an idiot. Let me ask you, you have left these actions in the past for many years, but you regret not having the discipline or common sense to not indulge in these behaviors.  It’s later in your life and you now have – COPD, heart issues, joint problems etc. that were mainly caused by these earlier behaviors. OK, so it’s too late to change the past but you spend far too much time in the present beating yourself up because of these stupid mistakes.  Let me ask do you think these thoughts could be having a negative impact on the present?  If your answer is no – wake up.

Second in your career – At an earlier time in your career when you didn’t have the maturity or common sense to excel you made some bad or even stupid decisions. Unfortunately, one of them caused you to be terminated from your position at a time in your life when that was very detrimental on other life areas like finances, relationships and your progress towards success.  Over the years you struggled to finally land the position or opportunity that you felt you deserved or were entitled to but for some reason it never crossed your path and you lived with almost daily disappointment and regret over your “long ago” bad choices.  Let me ask you – do you think staying stuck in this previous mindset is helpful in your present?  Starting to see a trend here? No, Ok, well one more quick example.

Third in relationships – Ever spent too much time, energy or resources on a relationship that was going nowhere or ended badly and in hindsight you regretted not ending it sooner, or never starting it, or being a better person in it?  Been there?  If not, I’m guessing you are close to the “perfect” person, but no one knows it but you. So, the regret is not waking up and paying attention sooner but for some silly reason - - hope, love, infatuation, poor self-esteem – whatever – kept you stuck in la-la land, denial or wishful thinking but in the end, deep down inside you - you knew it wasn’t right for some reason but stuck with it.  Flash forward a few years and here we go again in another relationship, marriage or romantic fling and guess what keeps filling your mind – “what if this is happening again and I’m not getting it?  Been there? Do you think these thoughts (regrets) may just have an impact on your current situation?  Duh.

There are numerous other examples I could give like – previous opportunities not embraced, previous investments made or not made etc.

OK, the other option is to see these life situations, circumstances or people not as regrets but as lessons to be learned or teachers that were in our life to help us learn the right lessons along the path into the future.  And how can life expect us to do this during turmoil, frustration, pain, discouragement, anxiety and yes regret.  It’s simple but not easy and here are just a few ideas to consider, embrace or apply to change your mindset from defining who you are to becoming who you can be.

-        Let the invalidating, negative, whining, pessimistic and self-righteous people in your life go. The more time you spend with them, the more you will feel life is not fair, you are a victim and you deserve what you want or need whether you deserve it not. Be careful who you are around – they are influencing you every minute of every day.

-        Get out of mental “auto-pilot”.  Start spending real time and energy evaluating stuff in the present and not using the past or the future as the guidelines for evaluation.  You don’t know what the future holds no matter what you do or don’t do, and you certainly can’t change the past.  So, if you want to have less regret in the future spend time figuring out what you are doing and not doing now and – why or why not.

-        Get some coaches and/or mentors.  Join a Mastermind group.  Have some life advisors you trust. Stop trying to do it all on your own.  Take stuff to them and ask for guidance.  Doesn’t mean you will or have to take it or not.  But if you don’t get it you can’t take it.

-        Accept the simple truth that you can only get better and learn more from mistakes, bad decisions and stupid actions.  If life is sailing along for you day after day with no challenges and adversity – trust me – you are learning nothing.  Embrace failure. Say thank you for challenges and then use them as learning tools not excuses to feel sorry for yourself, self-pity or even uselessness.

-        There’s a lot more, but here’s just one more for the road. You were not put on this earth to whine, complain and do nothing with the time you have been given.  You were put here to grow, help others, and leave your personal world no matter how small or big, a better place.  You can’t do these if you are stuck in the mud or mindsets of fear, greed, ego, arrogance and pride.  Want to make a difference – get busy making a difference – one person and one day at a time.