I don’t know how everyone else’s social media feeds look, but as I scrolled hither and thither a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a photo of a newspaper clipping titled “Biggest regrets of the dying revealed.” The short article explained that a palliative carer had written a book about the most common regrets that she’d heard through her work.
Three of the top five regrets have to do with people wanting to be more honest and authentic. In retrospect, these people realized that the most important things were to be true to themselves, or more honest about their feelings, or to simply let themselves be happier. Everything that prevented those things probably seemed so small in comparison, in the clear vision of the dying.
For a long time, I’ve stated that I have no regrets. I confidently plant my feet into the ground and say it fully with my chest. At some point after high school, I decided on this approach to regret, believing that it would prevent me from looking back rather than forward, to avoid being stuck in the past. To admit to having regrets would be to confront them, to accept the grief of the unlived lives and the time lost, the alternative world where I would’ve been slightly different from the person that I am.
Yet, the future doesn’t extend into forever and to completely deny regret is to deny realities about how I feel. I have said that I have no regrets, but in reality, I was wrong: I simply didn’t want to fixate on them. As much as I wish that they didn’t exist, regrets seep into my life, shaping how I see the world. There’s an entire world of regrets about the past that I’ve harbored for years and perhaps admitting to them now will make it easier for me to reach the end without feeling as many. Or maybe I’ll just feel a little lighter for being honest with myself.
I regret that I didn’t begin writing earlier, or didn’t read as much in high school, or that I spent too much time watching TV alone in my room instead of spending more time with my family when I could. I wish that I could’ve known how quickly the clocks would begin to move, even as my hours doing schoolwork never seemed to end.
I regret how much time seems to slip away from me, always faster and faster. Even as I try to constantly fixate on my mortality, as I try to make the moments last longer, as I’d like to feel as present as possible, time keeps moving forward.
I regret how little I cherished the many people I knew in my earlier lives. In high school and college, I was always so fixated on what came next that I never let myself really exist among my peers. I loved to think of myself as so special and unique and unknowable to everyone I knew. How could the people in my hometown or my college understand the depths of my otherworldly character? It was all a front for my own insecurities of not being enough for anyone I knew, but it was obnoxious all the same. Regret. Regret. Regret.
There would be more friends in the future, I thought, there would always be more opportunities. But is any one person really replaceable with another?
Even now, I regret how little I see my friends. Every time I do see them, I have a wonderful time and I burst with emotion. Why would I let other things get in the way of it all?
I regret how infrequently I tell people I love them, even as I fear that I’ll lose them. Why is it so hard to say it sometimes? What are we so busy with instead? I regret so many plans that I declined because I was too lazy or too shy. Was scrolling TikTok really worth it instead, man?
As I finally admit to all of this regret, it doesn’t seem so shameful. Did it really require the denial that I kept up for so long? Each regret feels largely like a lack of knowledge or growth on my part. I was young and stupid and I didn’t value my time. I was young and stupid and I didn’t value people enough. And sometimes I still don’t — I’m still pretty young and stupid.
The path to becoming the self is unnervingly nonlinear. Vices and virtues wax and wane as God delivers endless triumphs and devastations. I was once so powerful, I was once so wild, I was once meek, I was once weak, now I’m all of those things, sometimes and rarely always. I try to see myself with clear eyes and succeed only occasionally, hoping that I can slowly figure some things out.
Perhaps it is useful to see our lives as a series of failed or abandoned dreams, but to also recognise that these dreams are the very architecture of our humanity; to lovingly accept our shortcomings and lay them to rest in the knowledge that growth and regret go hand in hand, as do failure and potentiality.
Let these regrets lie into the soil and decompose, turning the ground fertile for a better me. Through the regret, I’d like to slow the world down and let love flow out of me like a river. I’d like to finally feel so connected to the people in my life that I won’t consider regretting the life I lived or the way I loved everyone. I want to let my current regrets guide me into a life that’s beautiful like blossoms and honey. Even if I fail, I want to have tried hard enough that I’ll be able to sit without a single regret.
We must do what we can to push back against the genocide in Gaza. Consider calling your US representatives to support de-escalation and a ceasefire or donating to Palestine Children’s Relief Fund for humanitarian aid.
💧 Drops of the Week 💧
ALBUM - Renaissance by Bop and Subwave - liquid DnB but also kind of indie pop?
POEM - “Thank You” by Ross Gay - Walk / through the garden's dormant splendor. / Say only, thank you.
If you liked this piece, consider subscribing to get emailed when I have a new post (every Thursday).