Beware the person who ‘regrets nothing’.

I think to live as a human being on this mysterious planet of ours its just natural to have regreats sometimes.  I dont know about you but have you ever met a person who tells you not to loose one moment of worry on regret?  That its a waste of time?  That it everything in your life  ‘happened for a reason?”  It’s something the author Ethan Gale addresses in his book You’re Not That Great : ( but neither is anyone else)

This subject is something I was pleased to read another person’s take on.   I had a mother whose favourite song was My Way (sorry to those who love it – its a song I just abhor) and who was reluctant to admit when she did something wrong that hurt or led to problems.  Sadly she also used to justify her own mother’s physical abuse and wrong doing towards her only daughter,   (at least until very later years when some of the deep sadness over it began to emerge.)

To my mind regret and the ability to admit we are not perfect and make mistakes (even only sometimes) is part of humility which means living close to the earth (instead of flying above it in inflation or denial).   Regret and guilt that is valid also helps us to learn new ways, to see where we may have been ignorant or blind or misinformed.   In 12 step recovery we have to deal with regret as well as resentment in our 4th and 5th steps seeing our part in things that have happened in our life, if only as a reaction to things we had no power or control over in the first place (like faulty parenting).

Anyway I am going to share below the little except from Ethan’s book as it made sense to me of so much and of why we should steer clear of those who claim to have no regrets.

Regret is powerful.  It stays in your body. Like swallowed gum, regret just lives in your insides and bowels until one day you die.  When they dump your body into the ground, over half of you body weight is untapped regret.  What if, instead of letting it weigh you down, you could make regret one of the most important building blocks of your psyche?

You can.  But people are hesitant to do so because regret is often coupled with shame. Regret requires admitting that you’ve done something wrong (or ill informed).  People HATE that.  People hate admitting they’ve made a mistake, because in this life, you don’t get any do-overs.  Sure, you can take action to try to make the next thing better.  But you can’t undo what you’ve done.  People can’t deal with the shame of making mistakes or having been wrong, so they convince themselves that they have no regrets as a form of self protection.

They say they don’t have regrets because “they’ve learned from all that things that have happened in their lives and those experiences are exactly what have made them the person they are today.”

If you hear someone talk like this, run for the fucking hills.  You are within the grasp of a narcissistic, delusional lunatic.

Let’s break it down for a moment, shall we?

If a person has no regrets

BECAUSE the things they have learned from the things they’ve done wrong

HAVE made them into the person that they are today.

THEN that must mean they have no problems with the person they are today.

WHICH MEANS they must think they’re pretty fucking exceptional.

RUN FOR THE HILLS.

I can’t imagine the same person would have the audacity to walk up to you and look you in the eye and tell you that they think they are perfect.  I cant imagine they have the chutzpah to tell you that there’s not one way in which they could have improved. Yet for some reason, because they have used convoluted logic and detached themselves entirely from the very words that they’re spouting, they’re willing to tell you that they’re perfect simply by saying something else:  “I have no regrets!”

Are you really so pompous to think the “person you are today” is somehow necessarily a good thing?  Even if you do consider yourself a wonderful person aren’t there always ways you could be better? Could you be smarter, or kinder, or more giving?  If nothing else, could “the person you are toay,” at the very least have been intelligent enough to know that eschewing regrets for the sake of feeling like your current state is something that others should be in awe of is a gross miscalculation and a super sad masturbatory way to live your life?  Maybe, in fact, definately.

You should have a million regrets… Regrets are EXACTLY the kinds of tools a person needs in order to have any chance of self improvement.

Don’t run from your regrets, use them!

It will be no surprise to those who have been victims of narcissists that they rarely have any form of regret or are willing to make an apology for stepping on your toe (metaphorically) when its really all your fault for having such obstructive or big feet!  They will also serve you large helpings of platitudes.  It pays to be aware that such things are out and out denials and a form of delusion.   Steer clear of the person who has no regrets and tells you there is something wrong with you for entertaining them!

(Disclaimer : there are those amongst us who can get weighed down with regrets and use them to beat ourselves up.  This is different from looking reality in the face and learning from and using regret to change and grow.  I am not a champion of self flagellation (anymore)!)