Learning from regret is a theme that has been coming up in conversation for me recently. My biggest personal example of this is regret that I didn’t hold my daughter for longer the last time I saw her alive. She was reaching out for cuddles and I don’t even remember if I held her or walked away, leaving her dad to put her to bed. It was just before Christmas, I had a whole bunch of planning still to do before the family arrived, and a night shift to try and get my sleep sorted for, and I naturally assumed I’d get to give her more of my time later.
I could spend a lifetime wishing for that moment back, to hold her again, smelling the smells on her head, kissing her face and telling her that I loved her. But, none of that wishing is going to bring her back to me in that form.
What I chose to do instead was was to change my style of parenting, so that I would hope to never experience that again. I did a lot of research trying to find the parenting styles that resonated for me, and found some great fits. After all, if an adult were to reach out to their loved ones for a last cuddle before bed, you wouldn’t turn away, wouldn’t question the behaviour there. I recently came across an article about adultism, which nailed my parenting approach nicely.
The other half came back last night telling me about this wonderful person he’d met on the train, and how he really wanted to connect with them further, but didn’t have time to gauge whether it was appropriate to get out phones and exchange numbers. So I reminded him that a business card can seem less threatening than asking to put a number in someone’s phone. They can put it in their pocket and think about it later.
As he lamented over this missed opportunity, I reminded him to stay focused on creating the next opportunity instead, and an hour later he had created some custom cards to be able to hand out.
There’s no point wasting energy on regrets, best to learn from them to create a better next time.