Regrets

[GMarenghi]

Lately I've been looking back on my past a lot and revisiting memories and regrets. Partly because it's the new year, also because recently I've tried to live more intentionally. I'm early-thirties and hopeful that perhaps some older members can please give some perspective.

I can tell myself that past mistakes are learning lessons, but what happens when I make mistakes of a different kind? Sometimes I wish I could go back, having all the knowledge I have now, and re-do everything. I might be in a better place now.

Also, less related to regrets but does anyone else feel troubled whenever they hear people swearing in public? I don't mean swearing angrily or because they tripped or something, but just swearing as part of their everyday language? I am aware that I am probably a sensitive person, but to me swearing just comes across as openly hostile, especially when it is unnecessary.

Thanks for reading.

[yggdrasil]

Hi GMarenghi,

Thank you so much for posting on here!

I agree that regret is a very difficult emotion to deal with. For me it is also be tied up with feelings of guilt and shame. I think regret is very normal and even healthy provided it isn't intense or obsessive, which is how it was for me for many years. It's a bit cliched, but I found a "forgiveness of myself" coupled with a "commitment to look for ways of doing things differently" was a helpful mindset. This is essentially how acceptance and committment therapy (ACT) works. There are a few accessible books on this therapy written by it's founders - it's quite a mainstream therapy in psychology at the moment. I also found schema therapy very effective at dealing with intense "self-punishing" thoughts and emotions around regret, and identifying the signals of shame and self-loathing patterns of thought and behaviour, before they get out of control. Also, it's a bit more esoteric, but I found Echart Tolle's "Power of Now" an interesting perspective on this stuff. The central idea is that human beings can only really experience the world through the present, and that obsessing too much on the past or future is therefore a bit strange... this idea is very common now with mindfulness ideas and mindfulness meditation etc. A lot of this stuff (including Echart Tolle) is written about in Oliver Burkeman's (the psychology writer for The Guardian) book "The antidote: happiness for people who can't stand positive thinking", which I highly recommend!

As to swearing, I agree that it's a bad habit in everyday speech (which I frequently fall prey to myself!) We should be creating gentle and open social environments for each other, and unnecessarily intense language alienates many people, and perhaps spills over into other bad social habits? I don't know. Waleed Aly and Scott Stevens talk about swearing in some of their Minefield episodes

https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/theminefield/what%E2%80%99s-wrong-with-swearing/11741332

which you may find interesting!

Thanks again for posting on here, it's great to have you!

[tranzcrybe]

Of all the experiences and lessons in our past, ultimately we learn the most important one of all: acceptance and forgiveness for ourselves and those around us.
We all bungle our way through life to some extent, trying to emulate the artificial notion of 'ideal', but if you could have a 'do over', would you really want to? Would your increased knowledge help or hinder your life as many 'mistakes' lead to unforeseen positive outcomes? - illumination, empathy, resilience. These things would necessarily be lost for the sake of such 'knowledge' and, as you rightly pointed out, there are always new mistakes to be made.
Swearing has become a generic part of language reinforced by movies and social convention as a means of veiling expression (ironically) or mimicking bravado. In times of distress, it can help to vent and restore some composure particularly when the capacity to express the emotions is limited by vocabulary and/or articulation. As such, it has lost much of its impact in modern society. Sadly, this gives rise to other forms of expression (violence, destruction) to create the desired effect.