Of Regrets.
Regrets are something that we tend to accumulate along the way as we journey through life. It’s just part of the stuff we put in our suitcase of experience. I don’t think many of us sit down over our assorted breakfast fare and plot our day deliberately in order to make a mistake that morphs pretty quickly into a regret.
Regrets seem pretty much unavoidable and inevitable and they have this wicked habit of surreptitiously sneaking up on you from behind and smacking you around the head with a large cooking pot. They then take out a serrated-edged knife and slice deeply into your heart, twisting as they go.
But… and this is the good bit. The moving on a bit. Nick Cave reckons that they can also help us lead improved lives. They can accompany us on the incremental bettering of our lives.’
Make no mistake, regrets will find you. They will seek you out and hunt you down. ‘They are forever floating to the surface. They require our attention. You have to do something with them. One way is to seek forgiveness by making what we call living amends, by using whatever gifts you may have in order to help rehabilitate the world’.
So next time one of these pesky little critters sneaks up on you from behind, lurking in your memory, turn around, confront it, look lovingly at it and see what you can learn from it. What lessons does it have to offer you and how can you use the experience to transform your life, your community and world… one regret at a time?
You will also find that if you challenge your regret, face off against it… the frequency of their attack will be lessened and the pain they inflict will be dulled. It won’t be easy …. but…