I think about regret constantly.
Regret, to an extent, is my guiding light, my compass.
I can’t think of a greater definition of wealth, happiness, fulfillment and purpose, then living a life without regret.
And I can’t think of anything more empty and disheartening then looking back on a life filled with regret.
Regret is widely touted as one of the most common negative emotions. I’ll take it further, it’s a disease. It’s a cancer that eats away at us and slowly kills us.
But unlike cancer, you can cure regret.
You only get one shot.
Not to make a cheesy Eminem reference, but seriously you only get one opportunity to really live your life and every day you are faced with choices, decisions and options and YOU don’t choose the ones that fill your tank, you succumb to the disease.
You find reasons to not do the things you want to do, go the places you want to go, take on the hobbies, passions and projects, rather than reasons why you should.
When you look back (and we ALL look back no matter how hard we try not to) don’t you want to be able to say that you lived a life without regret, rather than “I wish I did this” , “I wish I did that”, “I wish I took better care of myself”, “I wish I spent more time with my kids”, “I wish I took that trip”, “I wish I quit smoking”, “I wish I spent less time in the office”.
Time is the most valuable currency there is. What you choose to do with it, determines whether you’ll end up regretful or regret-less.
You can do anything you want to do…AND you can be great at it.
Everybody’s measure of success is different. I’m not here to debate that with you. I’m not just talking about finances here either. That’s too one-dimensional of a metric.
There are tons of people out there with way more money than I, tops of their industry, and I wouldn’t trade places with them for any of it.
And there are tons of people out there with way less money that I envy and am inspired by the way they choose to live, the way they handle themselves, and the things they’re doing.
Regret is like stepping in cement. It hardens and traps you concretely in your past and keeps you from enjoying the present. Some of the things we wish we could go back and undo are things that stay with us and reduce us to who we are, rather than who we want to be and more importantly who we could be.
So if you’re living with regret, what’s holding you back? What would be the downside of not doing something about it?
I don’t know about you, but if I’m going to have any regrets in life, it’s going to come from the things I’ve tried and done, rather than what I was afraid to.
At the end of the day, the only regret that will remain is the one that we allow to have a place in our lives at all.
Don’t be that guy.
