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Is it possible to live without regrets?
Results so far:
| Yes | 43% | 917 votes | Total: 2130 votes | |
| No | 57% | 1213 votes |
Yes
by Cinda Smaagaard
Created on: March 08, 2009
Regret is sorrow, distress or misgivings concerning events from one's past. More often than not, it involves how one acted or did not act wisely. It may be over someone or something lost, remorse over sin, or an event causing irreparable damage. Although you most often hear about one expressing regret at the end of one's life, some folks are simply unable to forgive themselves or others over the course of a lifetime. Their whole life is one of regret, for the adoption, the divorce, the loss of a business or finances, for not taking better care of themselves, or traveling more, or even something as simple as not going to the highschool prom.
It is possible to live a life without regrets because regretfulness is an attitude held in the mind. The sorrowful emotion can and should be put in its rightful place alongside false hopes and undeserved guilt. When I was an adolescent, I loved books by the famous classic author William Somerset Maugham such as "On Human Bondage." In that book, he wrote that if one were going to do a dastardly deed, they should damn well not beat themselves up for it afterwards. What I learned from Maugham was that if you know you will be burdened with guilt, remorse or a huge sense of regret due to the commission of a crime, then do not do it. Rationalization and excuses will not do much either to diminish the pain. If one is going to go forward, they will have to pay the price and when one knows what the price will be, you have one of two choices. You can feel the pain of regret or you can set your mind to dismissing it or allowing it or forgiving it or accepting it as a lesson learned, the hard way. When you forgive yourself and move on into the future, understanding that the past no longer exists except as some kind of mental construct laden with possible roadblocks to future progress, then it is possible to live without regrets.
Here are five ways to live a life without regrets.
1) Understand the concept of time. The past is no longer in existence and nothing and no one can bring it back. Memories are just mental constructs; bad memories are injurious to one's mental health. What you think may not even be what is in truth. That lady you slighted on the bus years ago most likely did not give your actions a second thought over time.
2) Do not do anything which you will regret. Sounds simple because it really is. Do not do the crime unless you are prepared for the time and, believe me, you will be harder on yourself than anyone else will ever be over the long haul. No one else really cares as much about what you did, as you do. Today's newspaper is tomorrow's landfill.
3) Forgive and forget it. Nothing is so horrendous that God is not able to forgive a repentant heart. Mend and repair where possible, but do not add fuel to a smoldering flame. Do not depend upon a past which is gone or a future not yet in existence.
4) Try to accomplish all your goals and challenges to the best of your ability. Job, school, travel, marriage, home ownership, whatever it may be, the only regret should be that you did not try your best to accomplish your own goals and personal limits. So long as you are still alive, you can still reach for the prize.
5) Weigh the cost. Regret serves no purpose but to make you or others sad. Learn from mistakes which are inevitably going to happen anyway. They may have been unavoidable despite your best intentions. It is not a shame to BE stupid, it is only regretful if one STAYS stupid or continues doing things which are potentially regretful.
Learn more about this author, Cinda Smaagaard.
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No
by Wayne Leon Learmond
Created on: September 19, 2009 Last Updated: October 07, 2009
To live a life without regrets is very very rare. All of us, at some point or other, will look back and think, ah, I should have done this, or I should have done that. It is natural, it is the way human beings are. I think it is possible to live without regrets, but to come across such a person, is rare.
There are always things that will haunt us, that will play on our minds and in some cases make us toss and turn in bed, in regret, wishing if only we could live our lives over. Yes, life is full of 'if onlys' for the majority of us, so we live our lives to the best of our ability and in the main contented, yes... but are we fully contented?
I have come across many people in my life that say to me that they regret nothing. I am sure that with some of them that is true, that they regret nothing and are happy with their lot. But the vast majority of people I speak too, seem to me to be stubborn at best. They say to me, that they have no regrets when really, deep down in the darkness of the night and in private they are full of regrets, and 'what ifs'. That they simply refuse to acknowledge the pain they might have caused others in not regretting anything at all, as they look back on their lives. Yes, these are the stubborn people that refuse to look back at all.
To live a life without regrets is, to my mind, to have lived a life that was and has been fulfilled.. I am fascinated by this subject because I have spoken to people who have told me -even after living through times of war and with death all around them - that their lives were lived with no regrets. They seem to acknowledge the power of fate: 'What will be will be' and all that, and rather than fighting against fate, they accept their lot, living their lives and never having regrets about anything that has happened - or anything that they have done.
I suppose that the title of this piece is personal to us all. One either has regrets or not, and it was quite a difficult title to write too. There is no right or wrong to this, some people have regrets, some few, and some not at all. The only people I have spoken too, who really do seem fulfilled and contented are some members of the elderly.
The majority of elderly people I have sat and chatted with have all told me that there was never a shadow of doubt about what they had done in their lives - or how those decisions affected others. They are adamant that what they did, the decisions that they arrived at, and acted out left them with no regrets at all.
Maybe in mass murderers, or psychopaths one would find this too, as the enjoyment of killing someone, to them, would far outweigh any regrets that they may carry. But I am writing about the majority of the population - who for the most part - carry regrets around with them until their dying day. As for mass murderers, one does not get the chance to speak to many murderers about regrets they may hold.. But in nearly every biography I have read about mass murderers there is never any ounce of guilt or regret in what they have done.
So, to sum up:
Yes, I would say that the majority of people do carry around with them regrets - like baggage that weigh them down. Some people just find it nigh on impossible not to have regrets and not to look back and think that they should have done something a lot more differently. What might have beens haunt us, and will always be with us.
For those rare few that do not hold those regrets, then does it mean that they have lived happy and contented lives, which again, to my mind is rare? How many people can say that they have lived a life of no regrets? Not many I can wager. So therefore, although it is indeed possible to live a life like that, I would imagine the vast majority of us, would look back and find it near impossible to have lived a life without any regret at all.
Learn more about this author, Wayne Leon Learmond.
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