Overcoming Regret

I've been talking with people and the subject of regret has been coming up a lot lately. I don’t know if it’s all this downtime so many of us have at the moment, or if it’s the uncertainty that is stirring it up for people, but it's brought me to think about my own relationship with regret. By definition, regret is to feel sad, repentant, or disappointed over something (that has happened or been done, especially a loss or missed opportunity).

Regret can be the gas to get you moving in a different direction, or it can become a weight of blame and shame. For most of my life regret ended up falling into the "control" part of my operating system and it caused me to carry around shame over my decisions and ultimately over WHO I was. Unconsciously, I carried the painful regrets believing that if I regretted something hard enough, then I wouldn't make those wrong choices again. This just wasn't true. This was control manifesting in my life, I was trying to control my behavior/decisions through regret, and by pairing regret with control it brought shame. Shame says you are bad, not just that you did a bad thing.

In my life, I have had regrets around money, friends, being a mom, being a wife, a sister and the list goes on. I got sick of it and I sought a better way.

Here’s how it would go for me:

Something would go differently than planned or maybe I disappointed/ hurt someone.

This would lead to regret.

Then control would kick in to fix it.

Then blame and shame would show up as a punisher so that I would know not to do that again.

Which would lead to more regret, but now I don’t only regret what I did, I regret the kind of person I am.

This leads to a shame spiral talking about how I am not good enough, how I always fail, etc.

And the cycle repeats.

This is how I have broken that cycle.

Something would go differently than planned or maybe I disappointed/ hurt someone.

Regret shows up, but instead of needing to fix myself and jump into control, I decide to sit in the emotions that come with regret.

This leads to acceptance.

Which leads to self-compassion.

I lean on a power higher than me, and turn to others when I need perspective or help.

My regret cycle is broken.

No longer is regret something that I am carrying around with me as part of control. It’s now something that kicks me into self-compassion and gives me an opportunity to love myself. In loving myself, I am better at loving others. I am less judgmental of them, because I am less judgmental of myself. I get to give away what I carry.

This has so radically changed me that I have considered getting a tattoo that says No Regets (yes purposely spelled wrong) as a reminder to not take myself so seriously, that control is not a good operating system and to put down the “all or none thinking”.

It’s never too late to grow, it’s never too late to love yourself.

Melanie Huggard

#noregets