Regrets. Do you have any?

[Ilyena]

I know I regret not applying for any colleges straight out of high school. My family was poor so I had it in my head that I'd never be able to afford a good college, even though I had pretty decent grades. My mother never talked to me about college or options so I just figured I'd have to work my way through it.

I ended up going to a community college for about a year and a half but when my father passed, I quit for a while because of family problems and depression.

I'm in school now and should have my degree within the next year hopefully so my life hasn't turned out bad or anything and I still make pretty decent money. Still, working full time and going to school can be stressful and tiring; at this point, I'm just ready to finish with it.

So yeah, now I'm wishing I had just gone right out of high school since I'd be done now and probably well into a career.

Do any of you have anything in the past that you regret doing or not doing?

 

[Martel]

Do I have any regrets? To be honest...no, not really. I try not to dwell on the past - I mean, what is the point in regretting your decisions? It isn't as though you'll be able to change anything through regretting it. Surely it would be better to just make the best of it, to put energy into making circumstances more favourable, as opposed to getting hung up over decisions you made that you would have made differently if you possessed the knowledge that you had now? What does regretting anything really accomplish? I don't regret any of my choices - I've made plenty of mistakes, and I'll make plenty more. If I regret them all, I'll be doing nothing else with my entire life...and no doubt I'll regret that, as well.

I'll admit that if I DID have the opportunity to do things over, I would do things differently: I wouldn't have quit my job when I had a disagreement with the manager, I would have held on to some of my closer friends instead of letting them drift away from me, I would have chosen different courses at College and worked hard enough to get into Oxford, I would have taken better care of myself, the list goes on and on and ON. But, the simple fact is that I DON'T have that opportunity, and no amount of regret will change that. So why bother? Past is past. It doesn't really matter anymore really. I made mistakes, I choose to acknowledge/ignore them and continue with my life, not regret them.

 

[Abstract Debauchery]

I think I only have... two major regrets in life. One, I probably shouldn't talk about in two much detail. However, I was offered a choice to do something that would have made my life easy as fuck. I would have never of had to work for as long as I lived. Though, the things I was called on to do I felt were... pathetic. Sure, I could have been rich, but that was a path I didn't want to go down. For the longest time, I felt as if I made the right decision. To be honest, I'm not so sure anymore.

The other is that I wish I had applied myself more. Everyone thought that I had the makings of greatness in me back in High School. I had the brains, that went without saying. I have a 185 IQ and scored a 2150 on my SATs and I did fuck all with them. I was under some grand assumption that the world was going to throw itself at my feet and I was going to walk all over it until I hit top.

Of course, I was fucking wrong about that, now wasn't I? I eventually made it, I love what I've become and I love what I do. Yet, I can't help but think how much things would be different if I did certain things differently.

Oh well, I'm still happy with what I have now.

 

[Six]

Hmmm... I'm kinda like Martel, but at the same time I'm a big worrier, and I prefer to prepare for the worst, rather than hope for the best.

The biggest thing I regret is not continuing school, to be honest. I would've had a couple of degrees in my pocket, making money and perhaps moving, or having my boyfriend move here, so much easier. I really wish I wouldn't have stopped after the degree I got, it's really not worth much as all, if anything, it is in administration, but that being the lower level degree... It's stupid too, 'cause I had the brains for it. I just never had the patience to sit and study.

Now, seeing how my life is at the moment, I know it would've been better had I continued, I'm too indecisive to go back to school as well, I wouldn't know what course I'd want to take, or if I even want to go back, it's been so long since I've been to school it's hard to get back in to.

That's probably, though, what I regret most.

/depressing.

 

[Chivalry Augustus]

I have a few but I do prefer not to think about them. I think it's inevitable in life that you're going to be presented with a choice of pathways at numerous times. Making a choice between the two, and finding in retrospect that your choice was not so good, shall always make you wonder about the other choice. In truth, it may have turned out exactly the same way (in terms of your level of fulfillment, obviously your lifestyle would be different) or worse. So why dwell upon that which has never been, and could never be again? If you're happy with the end result - the person you are - then what do regrets matter. In fact, if you only have a few regrets, you should look at yourself and congratulate yourself, that out of the millions of choices you have made, you only regret a few of them.

 

[Valvalis]

I regret any random time when I've been selfish or obnoxious to people, but my main personal regret is that I wasn't more open-minded about trying different types of diets when I was younger. I've been struggling with my weight for about 14 years now, and the main reason is because up until a few years ago, I refused to do anything but count carbs--even though I saw proof over and over again every week, for years, that it just did not work for me Finally a few years ago, someone convinced me to try something different, and it worked right away, and I was still able to eat plenty of foods that I like; but by then, I had gotten to be about 50 lbs overweight, and still am struggling to get the last little bit off even now. I had always just gotten depressed and thought I would never be thin when I was younger, so when I realized that this new eating arrangement worked so well, I felt like such a huge fucking ass, because I could've been thin all this time if I'd just tried that from the outset And now with lots of emotional stress that's been going on lately, even though I know what to eat now, I tend to eat compulsively when I'm stressed out, and now that I'm getting older I'm noticing health issues spring up that I'm willing to bet are related to not having eaten well when I was younger. Plus, I've heard that the older you get, the harder it is to lose weight, so...yeah. Pretty much screwed myself over with that, and I regret it.

 

[Jack's Smirking Revenge]

not particularly, because i'm pretty happy with my life the way it is now. i may have come around the long way, but i'm still happy with it. i'm doing things that i love, even if i have got to do them purely by chance and other unlikely circumstances.

if i was going to pick something, i think i'd probably have eaten better, not because i think i'm fat (although i do have a beer belly, but that's entirely different) but to see if that would have helped not end up being diabetic 'cos it'd be nice not to have it.

 

[Rydia]

I wish that I had stuck with gymnastics. I quit after I injured my foot when on the balance beam. Nothing too bad of a regret except for the "what could have been."

I also wish that I had switched majors in college. I knew that my current one wasn't really for me but I was too stubborn and wanted to finish it. And I was way too relaxed, was more about having fun and would think "It'll be 3-4 years". Now I'm facing the consequences of not doing so.

 

[Squid]

I have a few regrets.
My most major one was buying a house... which I know sounds stupid but I saved all this money, did nothing with my life just so I had enough money to buy the damn thing... now I am stuck. I am stuck in the same job forever because it pays good and anything lower would mean I can't afford to pay off the house.
I can't go on holidays because I can't save up enough and i can't study anything coz I can't go part time in work because of what I mentioned above

my other regrets are small things like "I wish when I was in school I did BLAH so it wasn't so bad" etc.

 

[Dean Winchester]

Alyss/

I\I had the brains, that went without saying. I have a 185 IQ and scored a 2150 on my SATs and I did fuck all with them.

I kinda know how it was, so I can say "been there, and made the wrong turn...should have taken the blasted blue pill". But you know, it is not the brain you've got, but what you do with it. There was a time I felt unstoppable, but a few wrong decisions, waiting for the wrong person, rejected a few offers I should have accepted made me waste a year or two of my life. And you know what's worse? The only one reminding you of what you could have done and didn't ... is yourself. The one you stare at in the mirror.

People had and still have high expectations of me, and I somehow can't let them down. But sometimes you feel you are holding the weight of your whole world (family, friends, teachers...) on your shoulders and if you fail, there will be a lot of people reminding you of your failure.

Chivalry Augustus/

So why dwell upon that which has never been, and could never be again? If you're happy with the end result - the person you are - then what do regrets matter. In fact, if you only have a few regrets, you should look at yourself and congratulate yourself, that out of the millions of choices you have made, you only regret a few of them.

You know, even though we started with the wrong foot, a man must accept when another man speaks the truth, and you definitely speak a lot of truth here.

Just like you said: there's no use dwelling in the past, and I'll add that it is because if we think about it, out of the million choices we could have made, either way we would have ended up picking the same.

Our choices makes us who we are, not our awards, grades, careers or goals. If it weren't for the choices we've made we wouldn't be who we are right now, right here.

So who cares if it was predestined, who cares if we do have free will or if Lady Luck had a say in it, what truly matters is what we are going to do from now on. We can either stay the same or take what we have and play one more game. Winner takes all.


Anyhow, about regrets... yeah I have a few. Few wrong turns, a few "should have done this and not that", but it is like Chivalry Augustus said, that "maybe it would have turned out the same".

Times in which I look into the mirror and ask "what did I do wrong?" but the more I try to make sense of it the less sense it makes, so I opt for not dwelling in the past too much. My main concern now is what I am going to do now.

My greatest regret was rejecting a scholarship to study in another country (I am from the Caribbean) just to stay close with someone I loved. But it turned out that she wasn't willing to do the same kind of sacrifice and was... in all sense, an air head. How I fell for that? I don't have the slightest idea. It seems the loyalty wasn't reciprocal...

I know, I know...whatever you may say to me people have already told me, I've told myself, and more.

Regardless of the path I took, it's time to "man up", accept my responsibilities and play my role.

 

[blakstang98]

I'd say that for the most part, I don't regret anything major in my life. And even if I did, it was a choice I made at that time, and I have to live with it. Some choices in life might be a no-brainer, and you made the wrong one, but no decision is ever unrectifiable (if that's a word). These regrets can help form a better a person in the long-run, which is something nobody should regret.

I would have liked to find true love earlier in my life, but its better to have that late than never. I've always looked at my parents' timeline as a measuring stick for the milestones in life that I will hit. And at this point, I'm way behind. I wanted to have a family of my own when they did, which was when they were 23 (when they had their first). They were also married at 22. And they owned their own home at 26 (?). At 28 years of age, I'm not there yet. Marriage is a reality soon, but I'm well beyond 22. Purchasing a home is a possibility within the next 5 years as well. And I'd prefer to wait for kids after marriage.

But with this, I'd rather find someone I want to spend my life with than to rush for the sake of meeting up with this measuring stick. So when all is said and done, I still don't regret my choices. At this point in my life, I'm very happy and I'm glad I made the decisions that I did in the past. All the very small regrets I've had, have had little to no bearing in the long run, so they don't bother me either.

 

[Big Casino]

I regret my career choice in a way. I earn good money and i have the options to work abroad in other countries or work offshore so theres many possibilities but i just dont enjoy it.
Ive never really wanted to be anything in my life so when i got offered a good opportunity i took it. I wish id maybe thought more about careers when i was younger. I think id alwyas thought i would just want to be something in time but that never happened. Things could be a lot worse so im not complaining as such but if anything thats probadly the biggest regret i have.

 

[Ethics]

I'd say that for the most part, I don't regret anything major in my life. And even if I did, it was a choice I made at that time, and I have to live with it. Some choices in life might be a no-brainer, and you made the wrong one, but no decision is ever unrectifiable (if that's a word). These regrets can help form a better a person in the long-run, which is something nobody should regret.

This.

I've mad ALOT of mistakes in my life, and to be honest, most of them were pretty obviously the wrong choice of what I was offered. I can't entirely say I don't regret them, because I actually do. If I could have done things differently, I would have, but I'm not ashamed of who I am. I've turned my life around considerably since then and I'm very proud of who I am and where I have come from. That includes my mistakes in some weird fucked up way. My mistakes my me who I am, and even though the experiences were bad it's just another thing I have "experienced and learned the hard way." I still make plenty of mistakes, but no where near the scale of how I used to be and I feel that is something I should be very proud of.

 

[Daenerys]

To quote that famous song; Non, je ne regrette rien. Sometimes, I might think "Well, if I did THIS... or if I didn't do THAT" things might be different. I might have kept friends, or made new ones; or lost the friends I have, stuff like that.

For me, the biggest "what if" moment will always be the courses I chose in college, and the Uni I chose to go to. I got offered the chance to go to one of the best Universities in the country, and I turned them down for Teesside. Most people I've spoken to are totally baffled by that, but, I know I made the right choice.

As for college courses, three years on, whenever anyone asks me why I chose Law, and why I didn't drop it. I still have no answer. (Other than the fact I got a B in both Law and English Lit at AS Level, and I loathed the English Lit teacher).

However. I don't regret any of the choices I've made in either my personal life or academic career. The way I've dealt with people, and lost people, doesn't bother me at all. The people I've lost; not worth it in the first place, I wouldn't trade my best friends for the world. Academically... I'm doing what I want to do, and in three years time, I'll be on course to do the job I've wanted ever since I was 12 years old.

I'm actually pretty content with my life at the moment, and there's precious little I'd change. I find regretting things to be a huge waste of time and energy. I'd rather play with the cards I've got now, than think "if ONLY I did this differently..." cause, I know, I've done it all my way.

 

[Starships]

I regret most of my past relationships. Two years ago, I met this guy. He seemed rather sweet and generous at first, and he would laugh at anything I said, even if it was lame. He made me feel comfortable and happy. But after spending a few months with him, he started to get abusive and manipulative. He would say that I was weak, worthless, that nobody wanted me, that I had no intelligence, that I was worthless. He dumped me when I was on the ground crying and wasn't concertinaing at school. On the ground crying, I told him that nobody wants me, and then he just left.

The year after, I met another guy. I told him my past story and that I didn't want to be used again, thinking he was different. We got into a relationship. But he was just as abusive. I couldn't leave one night, unless I gave him personal information. One night I refused to give him personal stuff, so he started committing suicide, and he said that he would kill himself, unless I told him everything. I refused, and he pretended to be dead.
After crying for ages, and feeling worthless and depressed, he awoke and said that unless he gets what he wants, he isn't going to stop playing with me.
During that time, he also got a different girlfriend. The girlfriend knew, and they would kiss/ make out in front of me, and he would give her gifts to impress her and just be incredibly nice in front of me. They would even tell me what they were going to do in bed. I told him that I thought that were were GF/ BF and he said that I wasn't good enough. One day, I just walked away from it all.

This year, I fell for a another guy, and again he started off being nice and friendly, and even asked him out. However he said no, and just wanted to be friends. So we started out as friends, and so trusting him I told him my story about what happened, and he said that he would never use or abuse me. After a few weeks of knowing him, he kept on messing with my mind, by acting nice, and then acting abusive like the first boyfriend above. One moment he'll ask me out to dinner, and then the next he'll flirt around with other women. He started to get really mind- teasing, a few months ago. But I broke out, before he did anything. He wanted to ask me out, but I knew what direction he was heading in.

Just, regrets. Just all of them. At the moment, I'm on medication for many different mental illnesses, and is starting to gain some serious pounds. I've also gained a serious fear of men.

 

[SaShman]

When I was in year 9, about 14 years old, I was in my English class. It was one of those moments where the teacher had given us a task and the students were talking amongst each other.

For some reason I can no longer remember, I started banging my hands on the desk and clapping to the beat of 'We will rock you' by Queen. I started out pretty quietly but then the people next to me started doing it. Then more people joined in to the point where about half the class was doing it. I regret that I didn't start singing the lyrics as that would have been epic. But unfortunately the teacher told us to shut up before I could.

Sadly I will probably never get that opportunity again.

 

[Jonathan]

An ex of mine got beaten, mugged and ra*** in a parking lot, alone at night.

I should've been there for her.

And different kids of relationships, sadly there's usually regrets of some kind to every one of them. Also I regret being 20 and not knowing what I want to do with my life, but it's not too late to change that.

 

[Saints&Storms]

Hrm, well I guess I regret; not making well earlier with my brother before he moved; he and I don't really hate each other but we did say much last time we talked; I regret not making him feel more at home with his own family.

I regret not being in my Niece's life more too. Not talking to my grandparents more and being more open about my problems with people.

Pretty much it.

 

[Lirael]

A quotation from Salvatore's Drizzt series sums up what I think about regrets...

'We, each of us, are at a place in our lives because of innumerable circumstances, and we, each of us, have a responsibility (if we do not like where we are) to move along life's road, to find a better path if this one does not suit, or to walk happily along this one if it is indeed our life's way. Changing even the bad things that have gone before would fundamentally change who we are, and whether or not that would be a good thing, I believe, it is impossible to predict. So I take my past experiences... and try to regret nothing.'

 

[Kandy-Sugar]

My only regrets would probably be not getting to know my grandparents more.

I'm a very shy person and I don't really know them all that well to start with, so it's awkward when we do meet up for family gatherings.

I have a lot of family. Mum has 4 brothers and 4 sisters. Dad has 2 brothers and 2 sisters. They've got kids and their kids have kids etc etc.

I don't talk to hardly any of them though. =/ Though I'm not as fussed about talking to them as I am my grandparents.

I want to make some sort of relationship with them before they die and I regret not doing so, but it's hard when there's no time to visit and they live so far away. Wish my parents had taken us to visit them more often as kids so that we were more comfortable around them as we got older.