Life is full of them, what might have been.
We have all sat and looked at choices we’ve made in life and thought what if I had chosen the other option, the other path, to say something different, to not leave that job or person.
We can often allow this to weigh us down with regret. It can then affect our future decision taking as we fear repeating bad choices.
Well, no one knows in advance that they are making a bad choice, otherwise, we’d be unlikely to do it. Additionally, there are no bad choices.
We focus on what might have been, as in something we don’t have. We could instead focus on what we do have. The grass is rarely greener, it is just a different shade and we can not have every outcome. The colour of the grass is how we choose to look at it and we can see it however we choose to.
So be positive about the choice you did make and if it turns out not to be the outcome you wanted, then choose a different path, learn and move forward. There is no gain in regretting choices as time machines have yet to be invented.
If we could go back, we would make the same choice as we wouldn’t know the outcome of that choice. We can only make choices on our experiences to that point in life and the current mindset that we had when we choose.
So perhaps it is better to say with a spring in our steps ‘look what has happened’ instead of what might have been. Even if it is a bad outcome, nothing is forever, change it and move on. It is all part of a magical journey and if we could make choices without risk and with total certainty, then life would be dull.
Philip Dodson 