Stop Regretting Your Decisions

Regret is something we all experience from time to time. While regret has some benefits to your personal growth and development, ruminating too long on the past can have negative impacts on your physical and emotional health. There are a variety of steps you can take, from altering your mindset to changing your lifestyle, that help you cope with regret and ultimately leave it behind.

Steps

Altering Your Mindset

  1. Understand the psychology of regret. Regret is a powerful emotion. Learning to better cope with regret means understanding the psychology behind it.
    • Regret is negative feelings of guilt, sadness, or anger over past decisions. Everyone experiences regret at some point in life, especially young people, but regret becomes a problem when ruminating over past mistakes results in disengagement with your life, career, and personal relationships.[1]
    • Counterfactual thinking drives regret. This means that the easier it is to imagine a different, better outcome for a situation, the more likely we are to regret that decision. Regret is most intense when you feel you've come close to a major success and missed the opportunity because of poor planning or inaction. If, for example, you play the same numbers in the lottery each year and, the one year you don't play, your numbers come up.[1]
    • Regret can have negative emotional and physical effects. Regret can lead to mental health issues such as depression and anxiety and the chronic stress associated with regret leads to hormonal imbalances and a weakened immune system.[1]
    • Regret is distributed differently across genders. Women are more likely to disengage from past relationships and tend to experience more overall regret over past romantic experiences.[1]
  2. Go easy on yourself. Taking on an unreasonable amount of personal responsibility heightens the likelihood that you will experience regret. Learning to ease your personal expectations, and accept there's much in life that you cannot change, is a good defense against regret.
    • When you find yourself riddled with regret, and ruminating over what you could have done differently, remove yourself from the situation. Ask yourself, "If a friend or family member was telling me this, what would I say? Would I think taking on this level of blame is reasonable?"
    • Consider the circumstances surrounding the situation or decision you're regretting. A variety of factors beyond your control could have influenced your judgment. Were you under to pressure to make a choice prematurely? Did you have limited knowledge at the time you made a decision? Were there multiple stressors impairing your judgment?
    • Say you're in charge of managing a charity organization. For an upcoming fundraiser, you've secured a popular hotel bar/restaurant well in advance. The hotel manager calls you a week before the event to alert you he inadvertently overbooked that weekend. As your group was the second to make reservations, he is honoring the first group's request over yours. Panicked, you scramble to find alternative options. You find another hotel bar/restaurant a mile down the road and a local theater with no bookings that weekend. Lacking time to weigh pros and cons as much as you would like, you settle on the second hotel. When the event comes, the hotel staff is rude, the food is poorly prepared, and the space is not big enough to adequately seat the attendees. In this scenario, you might regret your decision to choose the hotel and wish you had gone with the theater. However, how much control did you really have? You were put, by circumstance, in a difficult situation and had to make a decision fast. While it did not go over well, it's probably not reasonable to blame yourself.
  3. Accept what you cannot know. Regret, as stated, stems from counterfactual thinking. In order to stop regret, we need to accept this line of thinking is damaging. There is much in life we do not know.
    • All our actions have a ripple effect. That is, there is an influence to our choices that we cannot calculate. Usually, the impact of our choices is only truly visible years after decisions are made. Even if something looks bad now, we do not know what the future holds and the regretted decision could turn out to be only minor setback years later.[2]
    • Keep in mind, when you engage in "what-ifs" you're usually operating under the assumption the imagined scenario would be superior to your current state. The fact is, this is not something you can know. Try to imagine a "what-if" scenario that acknowledges the possibility the choice you made was actually the better one. Take the above lottery example. What if you had played your numbers that week and did win big? What if you quit your job, grew bored, and so the fortune ultimately resulted in you developing a problem with gambling, drinking, or hard narcotics to pass the time?[2]

Being Proactive

  1. Learn from your mistakes. Regret is like any other emotion; it serves a basic survival function. Be open to embracing the productive aspects of regret in order to lessen its duration.
    • Regret is how we learn to reexamine our actions. Personal growth and positive change would be impossible without something forcing us to periodically identify decisions that lead to negative consequences. Addicts, for example, often rely on regret as motivation to get clean.[1]
    • Reframe your thoughts on the regretful situation or decision. Think of mistakes as opportunities to grow and change. Young people tend to cope better with regret, and much of that is attributed to the fact they view the emotion as a positive. They embrace the fact that regret is key to change and growth.[1]
    • Accept blame. Oftentimes, people blame external circumstances for their actions. This leads to more bad decisions and, in turn, more regret. For example, say you were late to work because you stayed out late drinking. You might blame a stressful week or peer pressure for your actions and next time happy hour comes around you'll end up repeating the process. If instead, you think, "Staying out late was a bad decision and I faced consequences," you're more likely to avoid such actions in the future. You've embraced the fact you have control over the situation rather than diverting control to external forces.[3]
  2. Allow yourself to grieve disappointments. Sometimes, when circumstances are particularly unfavorable, we need to experience sadness. Allowing yourself time to embrace disappointment for an appropriate duration can help you recharge.[4]
    • Sadness is much like regret; it's a negative emotion but one that's beneficial to us as a species. Sad feelings push the mind into a hyper focused mode, which allows you to evaluate problems and figure out how to come to terms with life's difficulties.[4]
    • It's normal to respond to negative circumstances with sadness. Avoiding those feelings can prolong the duration of your regret and frustration. After a particularly harsh failure, give yourself a week to grieve your loss and experience your disappointment.[5]
  3. Evaluate relationships. Oftentimes, our most regrettable moments stem from bad relationships with friends, family members, and significant others.
    • If you're having a difficult time, leading to feelings of sadness and regret, are your friends coming through for you? Who is offering you their support and love and who is fading to the background?[3]
    • Identify those people who do not support you emotionally and who have, in the past, ensnared you in difficult situations. Continuing to foster negative interpersonal relationship longterm is something you will come to regret. Cut ties with those who do not support you and get closer to those who do.[3]
  4. Decide what action you need to take. As stated, viewing regret as an opportunity to grow means you're less likely to dwell on mistakes. However, you have to be prepared to take action. Figure out what you need to do to move past your regret.
    • Was anyone hurt by a decision you made? Did the consequences of your actions have an affect on family members or friends? There might be phone calls you need to make or letters you need to write. If necessary, take time to apologize.
    • Write down all the emotions you're experiencing. "I'm sad because X, Y, and Z." "I'm angry because X, Y, and Z." Look back over your list when you finish and evaluate what lead to your present mindset. What could you have done differently? What is driving these emotions and how could you reasonably eliminate them?[6]

Changing Your Lifestyle

  1. Practice mindfulness. Mindfulness is a mental state in which you are actively aware of the present moment. Mindfulness-Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has been used with some success to treat depression rooted in chronic regret.[7]
    • Being mindful means observing your thoughts from a distance. You're able to objectively evaluate your past and your mistakes, which allows you to be reasonable about the true impact your regrets have on your life.[8]
    • Basic meditation can help with mindfulness. Focus on your breathing or a particular word or phrase. Allow thoughts to enter your brain and withhold judgment as you experience them.[9]
    • Pay attention to any sensations in your body, such as itching and breathing. Take note of all senses, such as sight, smell, sound, smell, and taste. Try to experience each moment fully aware of your surroundings and feelings.[9]
    • Experience emotion without judgment. Allow yourself to experience sadness, fear, anger, and pain without trying to eliminate or repress the emotions.[9]
    • If successful, mindfulness keeps you focused on the present moment. This keeps you from succumbing to thoughts of the past and past decisions. Focusing on what you can control, that is the present, can reduce self judgment over former decisions or moments. Mindfulness therapy has been particularly helpful in elderly patients who have chronic regret over their lives.[7]
  2. Strive for abstract goals. Many times, disappointment and regret are related to failing to achieve certain goals. Shifting how we think about goals and achievement can help us better cope with regret and accept the present moment.
    • Tie your longterm goals to abstract achievements. Say, "In five years, I want to feel happy most of the time" rather than "In five years, I want to be at the top of my career." This way, you're sense of achievement is tied to your mindset, which you can control, rather than aspects of life that are often beyond your control.[10]
    • Research shows that concrete rewards actually make people less happy than abstract ones. People who are motivated by money, fame, fortune, and career success are less happy overall than people who strive for abstracts like happiness, positive relationships, and intellectual pursuits.[10]
  3. Talk about it. Having a support system is invaluable when it comes to coping with the disappointments that drive regret. Talking out your feelings can help you reevaluate them and gain insight from an outside perspective.
    • Discuss your disappointment with a friend or family member. Letting it fester can allow that to grow worse with time. Select people who've had similar experiences and can offer their insight.[11]
    • If you're struggling to overcome feelings of disappointment, consider therapy. A therapist can offer an objective third person perspective into your situation and offer you advice on how to cope with negative thoughts.
  4. Assess the present moment. Oftentimes, regret stems from yearning from a choice you let go. Assessing the present moment, and embracing the positives, can help minimize feelings of regret.
    • Regret is often the result of a thinking imbalance. Holding on to a particular decision, or a set of decisions, distorts are ability to realistically evaluate our lives as undue focus is placed on negatives.
    • Write down all the positives in your life, such as family, friends, jobs, and any successes you've had so far. In reality, each situation has benefits and drawbacks. The trouble is, when we regret we only see the drawbacks. Embracing the benefits of the present is a great way to minimize feelings of regret.

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Sources and Citations

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-mindful-self-express/201205/the-psychology-regret
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 http://oneshrinksperspective.com/2013/05/29/6-strategies-for-letting-go-of-regret-and-forgiving-yourself-for-the-mistakes-youve-made/
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 http://tinybuddha.com/blog/dealing-with-regret-8-ways-to-benefit-and-move-forward/
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 http://smarterware.org/5371/the-evolutionary-reason-for-depression
  5. ↑ http://www.oprah.com/spirit/How-to-Battle-Powerlessness-Martha-Beck
  6. ↑ http://www.womenunlimitedworldwide.com/how-to-move-on-from-regret/
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-mindful-self-express/201206/the-neuroscience-regret
  8. ↑ https://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/mindfulness
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 http://www.helpguide.org/harvard/benefits-of-mindfulness.htm
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 http://www.rightlifeproject.com/articles/three-things-you-can-do-to-stop-being-haunted-by-regret
  11. ↑ https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-couch/201206/coping-disappointment
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