Regrets in life

Aineoil

I'm pushing 50 now, only a month to go. When I was in me early twenties a woman in her forties gave me advice I still listen to in my head.

She told me never to regret a decision I made because at the time of making the decision for my situation, I made the best decision at the time.

It's human nature to try and relive what would or could have happened if different decisions were taken.

Like boobar I have a great life - an amazing husband, wonderful son, enough money to get by, parents still alive.

So no regrets here, just so happy I have been so very lucky in life.

Penny Tration

I'm 26, and have what would be considered very, very far from a perfect life.

I've made mistakes, but nope, no real regrets. Every mistake I've made has taught me something or shaped me into who I am, the morals I have, my opinions and so on. Choices I made were what I wanted or felt were needed at the time, so nope, no regrets yet!

gavdolfini

previous user wrote: »

Late 30's, unemployed did some courses in Web and It, basic, should have chosen a course with a job at the end of it, even at my age now, I'll feel that's it, Im on the scrap heap.
Totally lost don't see any hope in getting a job, I regret a lot. Depressed and anxious daily.

Canada or Australia, work as a labourer. May have to try certain ways to get employment though. There are also labour recruitment agencies all over Dublin just tell them you have experience on sites. Ull clear 500 a week putting the hours in.

Everybody makes mistakes its what makes us human. 25 no need to worry about anything. I didnt even travel to australia till i was 27 like lots of other people!. 34 now and im going back. Live your life the way you want to. Its too short to worry about spilt milk.

Aineoil

Jenny Thalia wrote: »

I'm 26, and have what would be considered very, very far from a perfect life.

I've made mistakes, but nope, no real regrets. Every mistake I've made has taught me something or shaped me into who I am, the morals I have, my opinions and so on. Choices I made were what I wanted or felt were needed at the time, so nope, no regrets yet!

I understand you about the perfect life. I wanted the perfect house and two babies.

We were married for about nine years before we had a baby. I'm still shocked we managed to have a baby after all that time together.

And the nine years of very horrible questioning about no babies by neighbours and so called friends was very upsetting.

Even now I get told I am selfish for having one child. It wasn't a choice
.
Jenny you are young, go and live life!

Super-Rush

I'll always regret putting the screw in the tuna.

Cienciano

Aint Eazy Being Cheezy wrote: »

I think we only regret the things we don't do, because then you'd always wonder "what if?".

I take the attitude that I did what I wanted at the time & whether it worked out for the best in the end is irrelevant.

I'll tell the wife that one when I go off and buy a Porsche

Penny Tration

Aineoil wrote: »

I understand you about the perfect life. I wanted the perfect house and two babies.

We were married for about nine years before we had a baby. I'm still shocked we managed to have a baby after all that time together.

And the nine years of very horrible questioning about no babies by neighbours and so called friends was very upsetting.

Even now I get told I am selfish for having one child. It wasn't a choice
.
Jenny you are young, go and live life!

Thank you

I'm living life mostly the way I want it, and making changes to live it precisely as I want it.

I'm really happy that you and your husband finally managed to have such a longed for baby

ZeroThreat

PTH2009 wrote: »

What do you regret in your life.??

25 now and have a few regrets

Should of done better in secondary school
Should of lived the college life more when I was there
Never travelling
Getting into a relationship when I wasn't ready
Not seeing many girls
Drinking too much
Not playing hurling or any sport

I wonder does anyone have the perfect life ??

Should of used 'would have' more often when writing perhaps??

eviltwin

None. Everything I've done I did for the right reasons to the best of my knowledge at the time. Some things didn't go as I hoped but such is life. I think every mistake I've made has shaped who I am and made me a better person. I wouldn't change a thing.

bottlebrush

I regret not knowing years ago that if you focus on the things you want, you will get them. Instead, I just took the things that came my way and put up with them.

Since learning that little 'trick' I can't believe how everything is working out for me.

force eleven

Yeah not studying harder for the Leaving. Not having a clue what I was going to do after it. And consequently drifting along for the next ten years....Nice to have focus at 18 but easier said than done.

Sam Kade

Matt_Trakker wrote: »

I should of learnt the word have

Ah well, that's what slacking off in school does to a person.

Sam Kade

Alondra Clever Newsprint wrote: »

Oh boy. If you those are regrets, you have a lot of growing up to do.

My only regret was that I never had a decent long chat with my dad. He died when I was in my early twenties and we never got to talk about life. I never told him how important he was to me and he never got to see any of his children married or with kids of their own. Apart from that: not a one.

At least you got to know him my father died when I was 3.

donegaLroad

previous user wrote: »

Late 30's, unemployed did some courses in Web and It, basic, should have chosen a course with a job at the end of it, even at my age now, I'll feel that's it, Im on the scrap heap.
Totally lost don't see any hope in getting a job, I regret a lot. Depressed and anxious daily.

18 years ago, a relative of mine went back to college when he was 58 and did a law degree, then did the barristers exams at Blackhall place in his early 60s. He is now doing a history degree.

Try and get some sort of degree and build from there, or like another poster suggested, hit Canada and go labouring while you are still young. Late 30's is young.. I know people in their 60s having to start all over again because they lost everything during the boom, and these are people that worked hard all their lives.. their spirit is still willing and that is the key.

I would have always taken the stance that having regrets are futile. Sure there are things in my life I could have done differently or not at all but right in that moment they were right. There is no point in worrying about what if's and should haves. Life was just as it was supposed to be.

However since my mam was diagnosed with alzheimers I think a lot about the past. I went through a tough time in my early twenties and took much of it out on her. She was my anchor. I wish I could go back and change that. Sometimes it feels like she is suspended in time, back in that place when I was 22 and she was doing what she always did, putting me first.

PTH2009

i work retail part time at the moment. its an easy jobs to some standards but can be quite hard at the same time. i have dyslexia and slight aspergers syndrome but i can still do my job, i do feel like crying sometimes because of the way customers treat me/ talk to me but people like that are in my life for like 5-10 mins (if even less) and i take a breath and move on. i still feel hurt but its small in the circle of life.

Cold War Kid

It's disgusting how some customers behave. Try to find a different type of job maybe.

PTH2009

Cold War Kid wrote: »

It's disgusting how some customers behave. Try to find a different type of job maybe.

id be a guy who would never complain in person nor to company heads etc. if i went to somewhere and was treated like **** id be mad but id complain to family/friends but never in a way which could hurt the employee unless its was physical or extremely personal .when your critized its puts u under pressure because to the bigger people ur the bad guy the customer always right. can say the hurt id been put through because of simple mistakes. cant talk to a certain fourm on here that could help me on this

Junkyard Tom

PTH2009 wrote: »

Not playing hurling or any sport

Fix that tomorrow. I'm considerably older than you and I'm out running around the place four evenings a week with people aged 20 to 40+ all organised online. Check out meetup.com and you'll see numerous events to attend including sports.

Edit: Actually that's one regret I do have i.e. not being more involved in sport when I was your age.

A_Sober_Paddy

chrissb8 wrote: »

I'm 25 and I'm travelling next year. I know too many of your type among people I know. Building up fake responsibilities i.e. renting, car, job. You can just give up all that stuff and go travelling if you want. You're at an age where you can post pone everything for the next few years and enjoy your youth. Grow up and act your age act 25 not someone much older. Grow a pair your life has only begun I know for me mine has.

Thats all well and good in the movies...But say you leave a job at 25/26 go travailing spend all your savings on this making an experience...come home after a year or two, very little money and very unlikly to get a job...

Reason for being unemployed for two years, oh decided to pack it in and go travailing, most places will be like..."thanks but, you've not got the job"

I regret some of the circumstances around my childhood, but I no power over any of that so there's little point in what ifs. My only regrets of any lasting significance are not spending more time with a relative, although I didn't know how little time there was left so I try not to beat myself up over that, and a relationship that should never have happened. Otherwise my boring, careful, cautious nature has prevented me from making too many mistakes. So far, anyway.

Cold War Kid

Pretty standard for people under 30 now to go travelling for a year or two, no? It hasn't jeopardised the employment chances for anyone I know anyway.

Junkyard Tom wrote: »

Fix that tomorrow. I'm considerably older than you and I'm out running around the place four evenings a week with people aged 20 to 40+ all organised online. Check out meetup.com and you'll see numerous events to attend including sports.

Yeah, OP you're regretting not doing stuff that you can still do. You'll regret that in time to come (lamenting not doing stuff when you could have been out doing it ). I know you probably feel ancient at 25. I thought turning 25 = that's it, youth over. How fecking incredibly wrong I was.

dark crystal

Oh, I've loads of regrets. However, the way I look at it is, if it weren't for the choices I made then, I wouldn't be where I am now, whilst not perfect by any means, I still have lots to be thankful for.

You could be rich, but unhappy. You could be well travelled, but lonely. You could be well educated, but in a job you hate. It's all relative.

You're still so young and have so many good and bad decisions ahead of you yet. Just go with it, but remember, always wear sunscreen

The Backwards Man

I regret not enjoying myself enough when i younger. Making up for it now alright, but kids, enjoy every minute of it that you can.

chrissb8

A_Sober_Paddy wrote: »

Thats all well and good in the movies...But say you leave a job at 25/26 go travailing spend all your savings on this making an experience...come home after a year or two, very little money and very unlikly to get a job...

Reason for being unemployed for two years, oh decided to pack it in and go travailing, most places will be like..."thanks but, you've not got the job"

The movies? No this is real life and I think alot of people go on as if they think they're never going to die. Burying themselves in careers and ignoring the most important aspects of life and eventually think back and realise the regret they have. If you want to do something do it. Don't let something stupid like fear of not being employable (which really it does sound stupid to think if you have a good degree or a qualification you will land on your feet) stop you.

I can't think of one person I know who has been affected by travelling for a year or two infact I think it's a very normal thing that occurs for people in their 20's. Most Employers look on it very favorably as well that you went and saw some of the world adapted to different cultures etc.

My point was do it while you're young (preferably) and have the energy and not so many responsibilities.

I guess I have no regrets per se because I see everything in my past as a lead up to who I am today - and I am more or less satisfied with who I am today.

There are time periods and events in my past that - if the same scenarios came up today - I know I would do differently for a variety of reasons - or not do them at all. But I can not translate that into wishing I had done them differently at the time - because how I did them then leads to who I am today.

So yea I guess I do not do regrets - but I take what good I can from aspects of my history that I would otherwise not be proud of.

Cienciano

eviltwin wrote: »

None. Everything I've done I did for the right reasons to the best of my knowledge at the time. Some things didn't go as I hoped but such is life. I think every mistake I've made has shaped who I am and made me a better person. I wouldn't change a thing.

I just don't believe that. If you relived your life over again, you wouldn't change a single thing? Even small things?

Cienciano

Cienciano wrote: »

I just don't believe that. If you relived your life over again, you wouldn't change a single thing? Even small things?

There is two ways that question can be taken. The first is whether if you would change anything in the past leading up to who you are today. The second if whether you would live your life differently if you could go back and do so AS the person you are today.

The latter - aside from being really freaky in terms of going through birth and breast feeding and the like in full possession of all the faculties one now has as an adult - is a much different question. If I were to relive my life AS the person I am today I likely would do not just many things but MOST things differently.

The former however I think is more congruent with the intention of the thread. "Regret" in the form of wishing you could make modifications to the life that led up to the person you are today. And to answer THAT question - No. There is nothing I would change - even small things. Because who I am today is born from those things - and perhaps even the desire that exists in a person to change X is predicated ON X - so if I did change X would I today be the person who would even want to change X?

So I am in the wouldnt change a thing camp too really.

Chain Smoker

Most of my regrets revolve around not bringing myself to cut my losses when things of all kinds had gone irretrievably southwards.

As much as you'll regret the things you didn't do, it can be extremely hard to even come to terms with the things you've done for far too long.

Keyzer

PTH2009 wrote: »

What do you regret in your life.??

25 now and have a few regrets

Should of done better in secondary school
Should of lived the college life more when I was there
Never travelling
Getting into a relationship when I wasn't ready
Not seeing many girls
Drinking too much
Not playing hurling or any sport

I wonder does anyone have the perfect life ??

Kids these days, eh?

What I'd give to be 25 again and have those as my regrets.

Mars Bar

Choosing the wrong college course. 3 years wasted ffs!

Saipanne

PTH2009 wrote: »

What do you regret in your life.??

25 now and have a few regrets

Should of done better in secondary school
Should of lived the college life more when I was there
Never travelling
Getting into a relationship when I wasn't ready
Not seeing many girls
Drinking too much
Not playing hurling or any sport

I wonder does anyone have the perfect life ??

Jesus ****ing Christ, you're 25!!!!!!!!

Get out there and live your life! The best is yet to come! Trust me on that.

ancapailldorcha

Not doing the J-1 when I had the chance. Parents talked me out of it.
Never took a year out. Might do that when the current contract ends.
Always been single. I've very low confidence there.

mickstupp

Not asking for help when I needed it.

... then asking for help from the wrong people.

ancapailldorcha

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Always been single. I've very low confidence there.

Something which alas is one of those self fulfilling spiral things. Having a low confidence can impede how one engages with the thing one is less confident about. The results of which can lower confidence - which impedes how one -

And so on. One of those nasty mental spirals - with no quick fix advice or solutions - that our species is - alas - all too prone to. I can certainly recall the depths of despair my own confidence in those areas of my life reached in my early 20s and can do little but hope you too never reach those depths yourself.

Even now I would not consider myself confident or successful or anywhere near average in those areas - so much as I have learned instead to work around them and work with what I have got. Which seems to do ok for me I guess.

Again in terms of regrets - I do not _regret_ hitting those depths as once again I am the person I am today _due_ to them. But I certainly would classify them in the "not pleasant" drawer on my personal memories of my past even if I would not change them.

greenbicycle

Should have listened to my parents, they were (almost) always right.

ancapailldorcha

Deleted User wrote: »

Something which alas is one of those self fulfilling spiral things. Having a low confidence can impede how one engages with the thing one is less confident about. The results of which can lower confidence - which impedes how one -

And so on. One of those nasty mental spirals - with no quick fix advice or solutions - that our species is - alas - all too prone to. I can certainly recall the depths of despair my own confidence in those areas of my life reached in my early 20s and can do little but hope you too never reach those depths yourself.

Even now I would not consider myself confident or successful or anywhere near average in those areas - so much as I have learned instead to work around them and work with what I have got. Which seems to do ok for me I guess.

Again in terms of regrets - I do not _regret_ hitting those depths as once again I am the person I am today _due_ to them. But I certainly would classify them in the "not pleasant" drawer on my personal memories of my past even if I would not change them.

If I were to ask you how you dragged yourself out of it would it be the same as asking about your self-improvement routine which I've had you recite at least a few times now?

ancapailldorcha

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

If I were to ask you how you dragged yourself out of it would it be the same as asking about your self-improvement routine which I've had you recite at least a few times now?

Possibly. And apologies if I have recited it often enough to be annoying. I do try not to be "That guy" harping on about self improvement and life management and the like. Which is easy to do in real life - but on a forum where your posting history accumulates over time it is hard to keep some trends down. It is not the only subject I get noticed as talking about more than I should even with efforts not to

I hate using the H word because of the sheer mass of nonsense and woo that has been associated with it by people selling all manner of "healing" and "self improvement" techniques - which is a shame because it is a good word otherwise. So forgive me the use of it here but -

When I decided to force myself into a better place in my life I did it by a very holistic method. I changed not just my self improvements - but my whole outlook on how I evaluate my progress - my quality - my goals - and my worth - and I changed lots of areas of my life. And I quite literally catapulted myself out of MANY of my comfort zones in MANY areas of my life.

And while I might harp on about my "incremental" slow method of doing those things - which is probably what you have become accosted to hearing me espouse - the sheer quantity of changes was large even if implementing them was slow. I may have changed slowly - but I changed a lot in parallel.

So not only is it difficult to say how I pulled myself out of it - sometimes there are aspects of the whole in which I do not actually know myself. There are things I know got better - but I do not know exactly what I can credit to that.

And in some ways I have NOT "pulled myself out of it" either. My self confidence in many things is still dangerously low. I have a relatively dismal self opinion of myself.

Some techniques I have acquired through meditation (for example) allow me to deal better with that rather than cure it. Often when someone posts on a forum like this complaining of low self confidence they are given a multitude of ideas on how to "fix" that.

In many ways I have not "fixed" it so much as modified how I let it affect me. When my lack of self confidence attacks me for example I do not cure it - so much as notice it - remain aware of it - but allow it to pass on by without influencing me. But it is always ever present - and I work on not just improving it in and of itself - but in my management of how I let it affect me. And I often credit the latter as being more important to me than the former - even though it is much less often the subject of the kind of advice many receive on the issue on forums like this.

Was that a really long and boring way of saying "I actually don't know"? Sorry if it was!

ancapailldorcha

Deleted User wrote: »

Possibly. And apologies if I have recited it often enough to be annoying. I do try not to be "That guy" harping on about self improvement and life management and the like. Which is easy to do in real life - but on a forum where your posting history accumulates over time it is hard to keep some trends down. It is not the only subject I get noticed as talking about more than I should even with efforts not to ....

Was that a really long and boring way of saying "I actually don't know"? Sorry if it was!

No worries. I did ask in fairness.

ancapailldorcha

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

No worries. I did ask in fairness.

Perhaps masochism is an issue?

ygolometsipe

Not checking for bog roll BEFORE dropping the kids at the pond.

:mad:

eviltwin

Cienciano wrote: »

I just don't believe that. If you relived your life over again, you wouldn't change a single thing? Even small things?

There are things I should have done differently but I don't have regrets and hand on heart wouldn't change any choice I made. Even the really difficult, painful stuff had its benefits, people I met as a result or experience gained. I don't dwell on the what ifs in life, I focus on the here and now. I'm in a great place so no, I've no regrets.

Son Of A Vidic

I have one major regret and hindsight is certainly a great thing. But if I could rewind the tape and be given the chance to choose an alternative path, I'd probably do it exactly the same way again. Better to try and then fail, than to never try at all. Life is full of regrets, some big, some small. They are an inevitable part of us living our lives and are thus inescapable. So there's never any point in beating yourself up for something that is now past and cannot be changed.

abelard

A question for those who have 'gone travelling' or are planning to do so - how did/can/will you afford it? All based on savings? I would love to pack it in and travel for a year or so just no idea how I'd finance it without building up a huge bank of savings first...

frazzledhome

No regrets but a lot of lessons learned

PizzamanIRL

I regret putting the pots in the dishwasher yesterday, thinking it would have been put on by now and they would be washed and I'd be able to make a nice dinner, but no, they're still sitting in there with dried in potato remains that I'm not bothered to manually clean.

Other than that, no regrets whatsoever. You could have lived the life in college, got too drunk and fallen in front of a moving car.

The past is the past. What you have done in the past had led you to where you are now. Whether or not you are happy with your situation now it doesn't matter. You've made decisions at the time and you are here now.

A lot of those regrets are completely manageable right now. You can change every one of them.

Nobody is forcing you to drink, to not play sports, to not travel. You can even go back and do a course in college and live the life.

No point worrying about regrets. It would be like sitting under an umbrella 24/7, waiting for the rain to come.

entropi

I've had some, but they're in the past and there is nothing I can do about that. Look to the future.

whatawaster81

entropi wrote: »

I've had some, but they're in the past and there is nothing I can do about that. Look to the future.

Here's to the future, it's only just begun.

JohnCleary

abelard wrote: »

A question for those who have 'gone travelling' or are planning to do so - how did/can/will you afford it? All based on savings? I would love to pack it in and travel for a year or so just no idea how I'd finance it without building up a huge bank of savings first...

Wise investments at a young age.

krustydoyle

I regret hurting the people I have..

Regret not taking the writing more seriously because I'm actually really good at it.