No answers to this trick question: what is your greatest regret?

What, more than anything else in your life, do you wish you could take back?

Replying to this thread.

Starting this thread.

That PJ Harvey vs Destroyer thread I just started. /drunkjen

Too emotionally vulnerable to answer this thread's question sincerely, but I will say that in general I try to realize that the person regretting is the person changed by making that particular choice and so regretting it is regretting too much else. I mean, that's kinda bullshit, because there is stuff I definitely regret, but it's not so healthy for me to fixate on it.

What I was thinking about when i started the thread was ONE of my greatest regrets which was standing and jumping out of a basketball rebounder when i was a sophomore in high school which fucked up my right ankle for the rest of my life. Why don't people take kids aside and explain to them that whatever dumb shit they do to their bodies in their teens can last till you die i ask you.

I've committed actual crimes.

Waiting until I was 21 to lose my virginity--all of those lost years and turned-down opportunities.

Sticking with home health for so many years--same thing, lost years and turned-down opportunities.

from 1988-2005 tbh

I am going to answer sincerely...

All the times that I've been too afraid and not strong enough to be honest about how I felt.

Honestly, probably choosing a degree that has done nothing for me. That said I met my best friend on tee course, so...

Last two are almost exactly mine. My degree has had value in my life, but I went in the wrong direction.

As of right now...letting stress mount due to illness (mono + severe chronic sinusitis), work, and relationship issues back in 2009 to the point where I had the first panic attacks in a series taht would pretty much change my life as I know it (not gonna beat a dead horse, you've all seen me in the Severe Anxiety thread).

this basically lead to the end of the best relationship I ever had. I'm still good friends with this ex and I've made peace with it (I'm actually close friends with her new boyfriend too, and he's a great guy), but I always wonder "what if?".

Not studying Computer Science at university.

leaving computer science three months into university

I've committed actual crimes.

― 誤訳侮辱, Sonntag, 5. Februar 2012 04:07 Bookmark Flag Post

Do you also regret getting that belly button piercing?

Choosing the wrong A levels, or rather not giving the choice any thought at all.

I frequently regret my irritability and short temper - but that seems a personality-issue rather than a conscious choice. I'd like to be a nicer person.

The first two-thirds of my twenties were almost entirely without direction or value.

(that was also the perios in which I discovered ILX. I don't think there's a causal link.

Going straight to college out of high school, when I was too young, too immature and not prepared for the cost, freedom or responsibility. Which I proved by flunking out in two years.

a friend of mine offered me the opportunity to invest in a new start-up company. i was too afraid to put my money into it, and it ended up being casio. i could've made millions.

My first two marriages.

That whole "back to the land" phase of my life.

never going to live in chile/argentina when i was 20-21 because basically i was too scared. actually my life has taken a great turn recently tho so apart from that not much because i wouldn't take away the missteps ive made that have landed me here because i know what's coming up next is probably going to be awesome.

My friend offered me a good job when I got out of college. I thought I could find a job in my field so I declined. I've been living living the poor life ever since

i kinda regret regretting so much. i've regretted things my whole life. i still regret things i said to people 25+ years ago that they probably forgot the day i said them. and i regret things i've done going back to early childhood. so, in essence, i kinda regret not asking for help when i was younger. help with everything. mental help, help with school, help at home, all of it. i never wanted to ask for help. i was always too embarrassed. i've gotten a little better at it in recent years.

but i'm in a good place now and i am blessed with so much that i don't really want to go back and do anything over. maybe that was the price i had to pay to get to where i am now. years of beating myself up and all the rest of the things that went with that. or maybe not. no, that can't be right. i think i just beat myself up unnecessarily. i still do. but not as much. life is tricky.

The first two-thirds of my twenties were almost entirely without direction or value.
― Inevitable stupid samba mix (chap)

i think this is hella common btw; i did too

The first two-thirds of my twenties were almost entirely without direction or value.
― Inevitable stupid samba mix (chap)

i think this is hella common btw; i did too

― "bruh" is the black bro (forksclovetofu), Monday, 6 February 2012 02:02 (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

as a 26.7 yr old & this is v reassuring
i figure a lot of getting anywhere is putt-putting around circuitously en route. & i think it's good to spend a lot of yr twenties learning what you do & prob more particularly don't want, thereby refining your direction.

that's a great post, scott. i really sympathize with your whole first paragraph, and i really hope that one day i can really sympathise with your second paragraph.

dear youngsters,
it gets better

ps but not necessarily

gadgets get cooler, the world gets worse

pps but almost certainly if you keep fighting

I should have done more drugs.

this is gonna sound flip, but my life is p thoed so no big regrets

buuuut i do wish i was more diligent in HS, prolly cost myself some dope opportunities for college, but fuck it, again, life thoed

I wish I hadn't have wasted 3 years of my life working at Blockbuster.

a friend of mine offered me the opportunity to invest in a new start-up company. i was too afraid to put my money into it, and it ended up being casio. i could've made millions.

defending your life ref?

yes, drive brought out all my dormant albert brooks memories.

real regret, not realizing my life was made up of my choices, so drifted around most of my 20s. all in the name of learning, I guess, and I'm not dead yet, so everything's good.

I regret starting smoking, and not sticking to quitting when I did.

i still regret things i said to people 25+ years ago that they probably forgot the day i said them.
why does this happen? i can think of shit i said in like, 7th grade, that i am STILL ashamed of. so pointless.

Self-inflicted shame has a purpose. It keeps the memory of your faux pas searingly fresh, in case you are ever tempted to repeat it. Think how many subsequent blunders that singular hell of shame has saved you from.

You're right. I haven't made fun of any little girls with cerebral palsy in nearly 30 years.

agreed that there are bad memories that are worth remembering, but there are some things that are just stupid and somehow are just as seared into my brain. e.g., there was a new years eve where i was dancing and i did a really, really stupid dance move. just hilariously bad, and some cool guy gave me this look like "what the fuck are you doing. don't ever dance like that again, you are singlehandedly making this a non-hip place to be for me". i've had trouble cutting a rug ever since (although 2 nights ago i finally loosened up and had a good time at a dance party for the first time in years).

I regret not losing my virginity to the nice, cool boyfriend I loved at 17, and instead losing it in a drunk 1 night stand when I was 21...and for generally letting fear/shame play too big of a role in my sex life, which I'm only just now starting to unravel and resolve.

And for generally letting fear rule too much of my life.

And for generally letting fear rule too much of my life.
And for generally letting fear rule too much of my life.
And for generally letting fear rule too much of my life.
And for generally letting fear rule too much of my life.
And for generally letting fear rule too much of my life.

yeah, that, definitely. and even when you recognize it, it's so hard to not let it dominate.

along ZS' lines: i remember being in sixth grade and riding the bus and there was nowhere to sit so i asked a kid if he's scoot over and let me sit and he said "why don't you sit in my lap" which seemed reasonable to me and when i started to he shoved me over and started screaming FAGGOT FAGGOT at me and then the whole bus joined in and that was pretty much it for my social standing for two years. Really wish I could tell that kid to say "why don't you suck my dick" and then punch the asshole. Would've saved me a lot of acid reflux as a preteen

Used to let past regrets rule my life, but the only result is being miserable or unhappy in the present, and it's totally not worth it. Once I realized I could just let it go, all of that anxiety and worry just went away. Of course it took a lot of work to get to that point.

Check out 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I know it's cliche as hell at this point and can be a little lolbusiness, but there's some good info in there about this.

This thread is a minefield for me, because basically I kinda wish I'd taken any road other than the "scared asshole nerd" one when we moved to MS, even if it meant in the future I'd never meet the woman I wound up marrying.

All this talk of fear (my own included) keeps making me think of...

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ykyx-CtTjH4/TaPKTAUevLI/AAAAAAAAAEQ/LIlDEOuvnfE/s1600/fearlove.jpg

i obsessively second-guess myself on all kinds of things big and small but serious regrets i try not to dwell on

Not getting more effective anxiety treatment in my mid-teens- not really a single decision, and not something I was informed enough to do on my own, but this has fucked up every day of my life since and caused me to miss out on nearly all of the normal Young Adult Stuff- I'm 28 (and a half, I can't help but remind myself) and I've done NOTHING because I'm terrified of...basically everything.

Every single thing I regret in my life has one thing in common and let I'm still too chickenshit to confront it. :/

it's ilx isn't it

damn you're good

hmm, hard not to take your display name personally there forks. all the more harsh for being true.

we are really a sad bunch aren't we? *group hug* okay, that's long enough. as you were.

awwwww

naw seriously E, what are you thinking about there?

it's a regret thread tbf, start a 'best decisions' thread and we'd all look like manic peptalking wankers

a fine image.

i still regret things i said to people 25+ years ago that they probably forgot the day i said them.

why does this happen? i can think of shit i said in like, 7th grade, that i am STILL ashamed of. so pointless.

― ELI OWNS YOUR HUSBAND (forksclovetofu), Monday, 6 February

yeah the earliest one i can identify is from around the age of... seven, maybe? WHY. and yeah, it's these minute things that gnaw at me rather than anything big. though often they circle around issues of social anxiety, so i guess not getting some kind of treatment for that is my big one. but then i'm only 27 and in what is objectively speaking a pretty good life situation, so...

lol cattlelicks

I mean, you'll claim not to be but the evidence is with me

i admit it, i'm a cultural cattlelick.

our rich culture of pointless shame.

dylan moran otm re biscuits

Not starting a band in college.

Other than that, I'm in a pretty good spot for myself right now, so everything that led me here can't have been bad.

I'm not sure I'd have been able to have done much different because my high school environment was so awful, but I really wish I hadn't waited until college to come out of my shell and get involved with other people.

I'm looking forward to living my post-retirement years consumed by regret over all the kids I've been way too tough on.