Regrets?

I've heard it said (sorry, no specific references) that some people strive for "no regrets" in life.  I'm pretty sure I've said that at times, perhaps even in former blog posts.

To an extent, I embrace the philosophy.  If this means taking advantage of opportunities rather than letting them pass by, count me in.

However, there's another side to regrets.  I do regret things now, and I expect to regret things in the future.  Included in these regrets are opportunities presented simultaneously with other opportunities.  With every opportunity, there is an alternative.  With every choice is a cost.  If we are fortunate in life, we will sometimes encounter multiple amazing opportunities from which to choose.

Here, I am reminded of Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken. We all face a "fork in the road" at some point, and we choose a direction.  By the "no regrets" philosophy, I hope to look back on most of those choices and feel that they led to good--to amazing--places (figuratively and literally).  At the same time, I may look back at some of those choices and regret not having experienced the other opportunity.  That's not to say I made a mistake or even that I would do it differently if given the chance. It simply means I would like to have experienced the other as well.  There have certainly been times when I've encountered "a fork" and parted ways with other people with whom I would have enjoyed a continued journey.  Again, I may regret the departure from those persons, but that does not necessarily shroud the beauty of the chosen path.

Perhaps some regrets are treasures...reminders of amazing encounters.  In the words of Alfred Lord Tennyson from In Memoriam, "Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all."

I leave you with Frost's The Road Not Taken.


Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.