Which is worse...To regret the things you have done or to regret the things you haven't done?

Answer 1

Regret the things you haven't, because you learn from stupid things you do. Its usually the smart things you want to do that don't, therefore regret.

Answer 2

My dear friends,

I believe that this is a very realistic and logical question that can be deduced using pure logic.

One should regret those things that have been done, and not those that have not been done. Why? i will raise a simple example, I regret having learnt gun-shooting as a hobby because it led to my purchasing of a gun that was subsequentely stolen by a thief, who then killed my bother. It is the past, something we know that has happened; therefore we are capable of feeling regretful. However, I have not learnt to drive yet, and I regret this issue. The problem here is that it is possible that on the first time on the road I could very well run over a person, due to my lack of experience. But if you knew this was the outcome of something you are regretful for not having done, would you then still feel any regret?

Please consider my answers, and I welcome criticism and words of education from our learned friends on the world wide web.

vhy~

Answer 3

To regret the things you havent done!

Life is short and we need to make the most of things. Its easy to feel a little embarassed by something we have done that went wrong but its far worse to sit years down the track and wonder what if? and why you never did something.

With our embarassments people forget and move on in life as it branches us in different directions and crosses our paths with different people. Meaning the things you have done that you regret or seem like a big deal to you arent as important to everyone else and end up forgotten.

Cheers

Answer 4

Regret is a strange melancholy emotion, and the one emotional component which grows with age. Ishiguro's "The Remains of the Day" is a wonderful English language peek into the very Japanese love for regret and melancholia . . . oddly, for Westerners, regret is not seen as a bad thing in Japan, rather it is something that is part of the human experience, and its savored.

At a practical pyschological level, regretting things you've done tends to be destructive; you have your yesterdays and you have your tomorrows-- there's only one about which you can do anything.

So, so long as you still have the capacity to do things--- eg you're not on your deathbed-- you can use a desire to do things not yet done as a goad; the past --unless one is seeking to expiate one's past through good works of some kind-- is rarely as effective a lure to exploration and achievement as the desire for one's future to be more.

Answer 5

No use regretting the things you have done, because they are already fait accompli. The things that could have been though - there is the biggest regret, because sometimes in life there is that one and only time that will never come again, a little too late a lot sorry.

Answer 6

Oh it has to be and is "to regret the things you haven't done". I'd rather have tried and failed than not tried at all. i mean, if you don't do things, you'll be stuck with the "what ifs"...what if i did this, what if i told him, what if i tried, what if....the list goes on. and the torment...oh man the torment! it's like not living at all. doing things, even with the possibility of failure takes courage...but we learn from them. i have always thought and believe that experience is the best teacher. you only "regret the things you have done" when you do them blindly. that is what the mind is for. it helps you make the conscious choice, taking into consideration the pros and the cons of any possible choice. Life's about living. Live it!

Answer 7

Twenty years from now u will b more disappointed by the things u didnt do than by the ones u did, so throw off the bowlines, sail away 4m the SAFE harbour,catch the trade winds in ur sails,explore, dream, discover
i belive this is very true to do and regret, than regret that one has never done

Answer 8

I regret the things I haven't done more. So many missed opportunities

Answer 9

What is worse is to regret period. Whether you have or have not done it. Now would be the time to take care of what you have done and then go out and do the things you have not. Quit worryin and start living

Answer 10

If one commits harmful acts, much to regret.

If not those, everyone surely has left many things undone.

My own regrets are the second. Bigtime.

No end to, "Could have, Should have".

I regret seeing this question.