Some decisions have very long term consequences. How do you feel when you cannot right these wrongs? I'm not talking about a situation where an apology to someone can resolve an old wound, or a different course of action can get you on a better path in life. I'm referring to situations which really are in the past and cannot be changed.
I'm curious whether there is a gender difference in how the sexes look at past decisions.Mind Fog Memory 3D Rendering Neuroscience Shutterstock-1202120962Pandemonious Trapped In Your Own MindPrison of Beauty Interview En L'air
A. I move on immediately and never look back. The past is the past.
B. I do think about them for a bit, but not very long. I move on fairly quickly. Self-doubt is toxic.
C. I believe in the importance of self-reflection. I put a fairly considerable amount of time into analyzing why things happened the way they did. Without this depth of self-analysis, I wouldn't be the person I am today.
D. I find it very difficult to stop thinking about the past, things that didn't go well. Intellectually I know I can't go back in time, but it's difficult to let go and not feel guilty.
E. I feel trapped. For whatever reasons, I just cannot move on from the repercussions of past decisions. I regret many things. I want to move forward but feel stuck in limbo... purgatory.
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How do you feel about past decisions, regrets, mistakes?
I've done things in my life that I deeply regret. They are in the past, but occasionally pop into my head. Nothing irredeemably horrible but, nevertheless, kind of rotten, mean, thoughtless, ignorant or selfish.
I don't dwell on them because they are in the past and I was actually a pretty good guy. I just chalk them up to ignorance. "Lord forgive them, for they know now that they do" applies to me and most people.
I don't want to make a list here because it would be too long and painful, but I'll give an example of one thing I regret. I'm not saying it's the worst thing I ever did.
In grammar school there was a girl who was pudgy and plain. She was quiet and not popular. My desk was next to hers one year. I would talk to her and treat her like a person. Her dad worked in the airline industry. She knew that I collected stickers and started bringing me stickers from all kinds of airlines. One day, a kid who was a little monster, flicked a glob of spit on her in class. When other kids laughed, so did I. I don't even know why I laughed. It wasn't funny. I took no joy at all in the fact that the kid picked on her. Maybe it was the kind of spontaneous reaction that people have to pratfalls. What I was too clueless to realize at the time was, she had thought I was her friend and she felt betrayed when I laughed at her misery.
A couple days later, I asked her if she had any more stickers and she said her dad wouldn't let her give me any more. In looking back, I realized that she had probably gone home and cried.
What makes me feel rotten is the fact that I didn't have the character to call the bully out. I was afraid of risking being un-cool by defending the unpopular girl. I didn't have the consciousness to understand how much I had hurt her. And I didn't know how to fix it.
Awww. That's ok. at least the laughing was probably involuntary, not a conscious decision. Yes, even as fully formed adults, you see the power of the crowd and people afraid to be outliers.
I question a lot of things. Just because I later understand them in context or in hindsight doesn't stop me from feeling awful about them. Just one example is, I have this intense regret about incidences with my many pets over the years. My dog was trying to communicate with me that I was causing her immense pain cutting her nails too short into the quick (I knew about the quick but if you let the nails grow too long, it gets worse, and I went too far this time. They didn't start bleeding until minutes later and by that time she was howling in pain, so sad at what I'd done, ignoring her pleas, and now there was nothing I could do. There was blood everywhere.) And one rabbit tried to tell me every night that she didn't want to be out on the balcony when it was time for bed. I thought she was just restless and didn't want to go in her cage, so if her cage was on the balcony and it was open, she would have the best of both worlds, some room to run. Yet so many nights, she acted strangely. And then one morning she was dead, mauled by some animal. We presume it was a raccoon. These miscommunications, me not understanding what they were trying so desperately to communicate to me, when I was usually very empathic, are still so painful to think about. I can't get over them. There are other life decisions, and conversations, etc., of course, but the animals I feel most guilty about, because they were so innocent, didn't do anything wrong.
Wow, Amanda. Those are good examples of the kinds of things that haunt us, make our skin prickle and our chest tighten. We can forgive ourselves because we honestly didn't know any better. But to forgive is not to forget. Life can be a mess. Actually, it IS a mess. We all blunder our way through. We live and learn from experience. Along the way, we cause our share of pain. Carrying around pain and regret is everyone's lot in life, at least those who are mentally/emotionally healthy.
Horrible. There has been plenty of times I wish I could have gone back in time & corrected some of my major mistakes. From the perspective of the popular television show Quantum Leap, I wish I could have gone back in time, corrected my major mistakes which I knew for a fact those mistakes would have a life-time effect onto me, put right that once had been wrong in the first place,... but considering no time machine exists, ... those type of mistakes are always going to be with me, they are always going to have a long lasting, life-time effect on me regardless if I try & move on or not, unfortunately effecting my personality to the point where I end up becoming a person that I don't approve of & I will never be the same after that.
I regret for what I chose to ignore in the past. When actually, it should have been expressed loud and clear.
There're times I thought it's not important until it's too late. I'm learning to be a better talker and thinker. To prevent that happen again in the future, and not to be misunderstood. I must not be in my comfort zone, be passive and just think that one day people will realize who I am and how I think without any effort to communicate at all.
I've made some questionable decisions in the past and I wonder if I'd make those decisions again if I could and naturally a person wouldn't. But I would. It has made me who I am. All the mistakes, lapse in judgements, regrets all of them have made me who I am and I am happy with what I am today. Not satisfied but happy. At least I'm on te correct path. And that's what matters at the end.
I reflect a lot but I don't really regret. I made the best decisions I could with what I was aware of at the time. Later on if I grow more and see things differently it's pointless to make myself feel bad about something I didn't know at the time.
Life is a journey and you grow along the way that's just how it is so execting perfection of yourself at the start of your journey is just gonna make you miserable. And if you're always thinking about what could have been you're probably not gonna make the best decisions in the present either so you'll just have even more to regret :D
I went for C but sometimes A or B depending on the context. Well, I don't see how it even helps whomever we wronged to dwell over it. It's like learn whatever there is to learn and move on if we're capable of that.
Where I tend to be haunted at times about is the present. I've found the older I get that my ability to avoid being angry or acting in a hostile or petty way towards people I care about keeps improving and improving. I've gained some maturity there.
Yet when it comes to complete strangers and people I hardly care about, sometimes I wonder if the opposite is happening. I'm more capable than ever before of snapping. So that bugs me sometimes and I might explore the past and try to figure out where that unbridled rage comes from towards those I care little about. Yet the past itself doesn't haunt me. It's more the present. I use the past to diagnose the present.
I like to say i wish my past decisions was different , i never saw my Niece , Sister , My Father since they was at my Uncles funeral. So that has been 6 years now, i miss the most my Niece , now she is age 18 , she graduated from High School. I just wished i would of stayed in contact with her. It hurts me a lot but what can i do to make mends this is wrong decision. On May 7th my Father turns age 79 and the year after is age 80 so lot of these things go on in my head just wish things were different. I don't know whose to blame? It just seems that no one wants to make mends?
I had to learn about myself... that I'm a thinker, background processor and I will ruminate on things. I had to learn the hard way this wears me out. I look for the value in things, and I turn them over to God now much more quickly.
I think it is much better to be immediate with things that are a problem... deal with them rather than let them fester... when possible.
I wish I didn’t grow up to be such a doormat. My parents were super strict and really pushed me around as a kid and squashed any rebellious spirit I could conjure up.
Ah that's a shame. Yes parents have such a huge impact on us eh. My parents were quite eccentric and encouraged me to question the world. I am glad about those two aspects of them. In other ways, I thought they were batshit crazy sometimes. But getting older, I find it more comical now.
Yeah I suppose. I am glad I am seeing through their traps now and I think they know it. They have mainly just become either too serious or too boring. It’s hard to make them laugh at a joke so I don’t even bother anymore. I am working on not being pushed around anymore thankfully.
I find it very difficult to stop thinking about the past, things that didn't go well. Intellectually I know I can't go back in time, but it's difficult to let go and not feel guilty.
Do your best always works for me. When something doesn't go the way you expected you can say you did the best you could. Sometimes I say it seemed like the thing to do at the time. Yes I believe that regret is toxic
Sometimes I let my past decisions rule my thinking which meaningless in the present. Can't change any of those things. I do keep them in mind so as not to make the same mistakes again.
I think past decisions, regrets and mistakes SHOULD be talked about, and then dealt with. After that, you should learn from it and let it lead you to make better decisions in life.
I think mistakes from the past serve as examples of what to do better next time. Though it was unpleasant, I'm glad I have that memory to deter me from making the same mistake.
I feel horrible. As i am a kind of guy that most of the time do things perfectly. So when i mess up i mess up big. And my mistakes are irreparable. And long lasting.
I kinda regret a few things but don't let ot really bother me. What happened in the past stays in the past. No use in thinking about it as it only brings you down.
I feel like whatever happened has brought me to where I am now. I'm glad about it all.. the entire journey from there to here, present. They make me who I am now, today.
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