"If I knew then what I know now ..."

[Razor X]

There's probably not a person alive who wouldn't do at least some things differently if given a chance to go back in time and do them over again.  I don't have too many major regrets, other than some jobs I wish I hadn't taken, some relationships that I wish I hadn't gotten involved in, and other relationships that I wish I had gotten involved in.  But the one thing I wish I'd done differently is that I wish I'd gotten more focused oh health and fitness at a younger age.  But I guess most of us don't focus much on that sort of thing until a health scare arises or we start to see the clock ticking.

Oh yeah, and I wish I'd started shaving my head much sooner! 

What would you do differently?

[Tyler]

I would have shaved my head starting in high school.  I always wore it short, but didn't do more but buzz it. 

I would have also gotten involved in more relationships despite the "reputation" of the girl or what group she hung out with.  I passed up on some hot chicks just because they weren't in the "right" group for fear of what others would think.   There's also the few I wish I would have passed on because they turned out to be PSYCHO!  Like the chick who's dad was the sheriff - she liked to follow me around without me knowing to see "what I did during the day."  PSYCHO!

[nomad]

I can't say I have many if any regrets, I look at the things I been through and done as learning experiances all the good the bad and the dumba$$. I just hope I really did learn from some of them.

[SLYinKC]

I really can't pinpoint any one thing and say that I wish I'd done it differently.  But the one thing I do find as I've gotten older (but not that old...) is that you can't be afraid to take chances and step outside of your normal comfort zone.  Going SLY was a big demonstration of that.  There are probably other instances where I would have taken more chances when I was younger if I had understood that life if just way to short to always take the safe route.

[PBurke]

regrets? hell no. what i have done has made me who i am. if i changed things i wouldn't be the person i am today. if i did it, i either enjoyed it or had good reason to do it at the time. so no i would not change a damn thing. life is way too short to live with regrets or to not take risks. one of my favorite sayings is "I am not afraid of dying, but i am afraid of not living." let that soak in awhile.

[Razor X]

... one of my favorite sayings is "I am not afraid of dying, but i am afraid of not living." let that soak in awhile.

I don't disagree with that.  I'm not saying that we shouldn't take chances or that we should spend our times wringing our hands over things that have happened in the past.  But I think most of us do have one or two things that we did and later wished we didn't -- or things that we didn't do and wished we had.  It's not so much about living with regret as it is about learning from past mistakes and not repeating them.

[JDog]

I do regret gettting wrecked too much in my younger years and missing out on some oppurtunities with playing football and music.

However as a whole I am happy the direction that my life is in and wouldnt change a damn thing.

I am quite proud of myself that I waited until late 20's before getting tattooed. A lot of my friends got these awful tattoos in high school as spur of the moment jobs and they regret it now. Many are so badly done that even just 7 years later, they look like piles of black and green mush on their arms.

A good tattoo is never cheap but a cheap tattoo is almost never good(IE never go to a shop that advertises Buy 1 tattoo get 1 free).

[PBurke]

you are right razor. learning is a good thing. i have done things that i realize i shouldn't have done. but i did learn from that. but harboring regret is too time consuming.

[D.A.L.U.I.]

I don't so much as regret as have a great deal of curiosity about the "roads not taken."  What if I hadn't been sent away to boarding school, what if I had gone to another college, what if I had accepted the Peace Corps rather than going straight into law school, what if I hadn't gotten out of the Viet Nam draft, etc.  All those junctions where I had different choices, any one of them would have changed my life.  Maybe each one of them is a great book, and I'm missing the choice, yes another junction, of writing them--maybe a lot of money too!
But, as Edith Piaf sang, I regret nothing.  I do wonder though, where and who would I be.  One thing I and others don't wonder about, there was no choice in MPB, where ever I could have been, I'd be going bald.  So to the extent it's regret, I wish I'd taken the plunge on getting buzzed much earlier, at least 2 to 3 years--it would have worked I think.  Instead, four months ago today I needed a haircut, I sat waiting my turn and then into the chair and said, "Louis, take it to a buzz!"  The feeling of driving back to the office that pleasant day w/ the top down feeling my scalp through 3/8" was a real trip.  But it was evident in the sunshine that I probably didn't have enough to support a real buzz--too far gone on top, what I call the runway.  Yup, its the only junction in the road I should have taken much sooner.

[BaldBen]

This thread remind me of the lyrics to a Ben Folds Five song.
Regrets

i thought about sitting on the floor in second grade
i couldn't keep the pace
i thought i was the only one moving in slow motion
while the other kids knew something i did not
but if i acted like a clown
i thought it'd get me through, it did
but that don't work no more
you're not a kid no more
i thought i'd do some travelling
never did
regrets, regrets

i thought about the hours wasted
watching t.v., drinking beer
i thought about the things i thought about
until immobilized with fear
and all the great ideas i had
and how we just made fun
of those who had the guts to try and fail
and then i ended up in jail
regrets, regrets

... but just for a day
seems the police had made a computer mistake
said there must be thousands like me with the same name
anyway, i thought about the things i settled for or never tried
i never visited my grandma even once
when she was sick before she died
so i don't blame you if you never come to see me here again
regrets, regrets...

I have a few regrets..
Hopefully, there won't be too many more regrets in my lifetime.
I'm a sensible sort of guy and try to live my life by making intelligent and sensible decisions. Headshaving was a one of those sensible decisions. No regrets there. 

[GASlick]

No regret; however, I would not have gotten married at 21 if I had to do it again.  I absolutely without a doubt would have married my wife....I would have just put it off until 25 or so.  She is the person I want to spend the rest of my life with.     I just wonder if I missed some things by not being a bachelor for a few years.

[RodgerDodger]

No regret; however, I would not have gotten married at 21  I just wonder if I missed some things by not being a bachelor for a few years.

Getting married that young kept you out of trouble and making many regrettable choices.
I'd say you're a lucky man, GASlick. 

Rodger, over and out!

[Robmeister]

I stumbled across a regret that I do have.

Life's ups, downs, mistakes, failures and victories ALL...repeat, ALL come together--as Paulie says--to make us who we are.  So changing anything would alter the course of where we've come.

HOWEVER, there is one regret I have that I believe I could have done without.

Ok, I've been free of all illegal substance use/abuse since, like, '89 - '90....

Go to a Rush concert in 2004 at Red Rocks Amphitheatre...

Havin' a great time....some beers with my buddys, etc...

Next thing I know, here comes a joint being passed down the row...took a big ol' hit off the damn thing.

On top of many beers it sent me into a tail spin and ruined my buzz.....seemed like it doubled or TRIPLED the liquor I consumed.

That I can get over....but I had to tell the Polygraph examiner during my Sheriff testing.   Put a HUGE strike against me in the eligibility ranking.

If I could do that over again....I would _NOT_ have toked on that bad boy.

[schro]

Regrets? One is probably taken my initial career steps out of college a bit more seriously (thought I was bullet proof). However, I am quite happy with the road my life has taken. Married to an incredible lady (The Lovely Mrs. Schro), have two great kids, and my personal life (home, friends, family, future) are all pretty positive. To make changes in my past would have definitely made these quite different.

Still, I am curious about the "what if's". One thing that I always wondered was military service. In college, I was the top student in our accounting department. The Dean of Accounting (one of the sharpest men I've ever met) suggested I consider the military after college (probably for discipline & focus). I quickly dismissed it.

As I've matured and gotten to know many ex-servicemen, I have the utmost respect for their demeanor & the way they approach life. One of them is my oldest brother-in-law. He is a great guy in all aspects. Then again, I likely would not have met him had I taken the Dean's advice.

[clipped]

I am going to revive this thread, because of the good comments here and because it's something I've been thinking about a lot lately.  Like others who posted here, it's the "what ifs", the roads not taken that get me thinking sometimes.  For me, mostly, it's the career courses not chosen and the reasons I didn't pursue them that bother me.  Mostly, I didn't choose these other paths because I was either afraid of failure, or was actively discouraged by guidance counselors and my family that I was reaching too far.  The latter of these (school & family discouragement) actually fed the former (fear of failure), which negatively influenced some aspects my life.   However, as others have said, I lucked out with a great career that I do love, a great wife and 4 great children. Even though one of our children died as a preteen from a congenital illness (probably the greatest challenge of my life), I wouldn't trade any of it.  It's all made me who I am. 

Having said that, the "learned" fear of failure from early discouragement did affect me and show up in somewhat inconsequential aspects of my life like being fearful of buzzing or shaving for too long (until I finally embraced shaving - what was I afraid of?); fear of people's reaction if I let my beard grow; and more important aspects of life like truly expressing my feelings. So, that's what I need to work on now. The key is to pursue what you really want and make good choices.  I have realized that while I may have regrets for roads not take, I need to remember that had I taken other roads, there is no guarantee that my life would be "better" than what I have now (which is great) and may very well have been "worse"; more challenging or even more disappointing than what my life's experience has been.