what's your biggest regret in life?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow, where to start. I guarantee I am the biggest failure on DCUM. I have so many regrets.

I regret that I was lazy and self-destructive and never worked hard to get good grades. I'm as intelligent and far better-read than the 4.0 GPA holders I know, but because of my laziness and lack of time management skills and motivation and discipline (oh, and zero self-esteem and self-destructive instincts) I:

- graduated high school with a 3.0 and went to a shitty local state school that I still regret attending.
- graduated college with a 3.1 and went to a mid-level law school
- graduated law school with a 2.9 (always one point lower - that amuses me) and somehow got a job.

And now as a lawyer I'm applying myself for the first time and am bitter and shocked to see how good I am at what I do. I could have gone to Ivies if I had worked this hard when I was younger. I REALLY regret it. Like it or not, people in DC judge you by the schools you went to.

I also regret not losing weight while I was still young enough to enjoy being pretty. That goes back to the same laziness I had in all areas of my life.

I regret getting so deep into credit card debt as a student.

I regret that I was nearly evicted from my apartment because I couldn't make rent.

I regret that I almost never had any romantic success with the opposite sex because I had no confidence in myself.

I'm a failure.

You are not a failure because at least you have gone out and tried. Failures are people who never even do that.

[Anonymous]

I made lots of bad decisions in my 40 years of life, but it's hard to say I regret any of them because otherwise I wouldn't have married who I married, and have the kids I have.

Bad decision: dating an idiot/asshole for years in high school and college…
Bad decision: not stretching myself and applying to more prestigious schools…
Bad decision: one-night stands in college…
Bad decision: sleeping with much older married men in positions of power…
Bad decision: marrying the person I married first who was not a good person or the right fit for me...
Bad decision: cheating on him, even having to have an abortion

After I got all of that out of my system by age 30, the last decade has been terrific.

It's funny, because I'm now facing a big life decision about whether or not to keep working and/or how much, and I'm letting my decision-making process by driven by the idea of future regret. I worry if I leave my current job, I will regret it. I worry that if I stay home or cut way back to spend more time with the kids, I will regret it. I should probably just decide based on what i want my days to look like in the near future -- working a high-pressure job, earning money, working my brain….or being at home more, spending time with them.

Kind of epiphany I've had, just writing this. DCUM is the best!

[Anonymous]

Life is about minimizing regret

- from 30 Rock

[Anonymous]

Joking aside, I wish I had more children. And I wish I moved my child to a public school.

[Anonymous]

I regret not communicating better, taking more risks, and not being note astute at people and politics. I also regret finding this website.

[Anonymous]

living

[Anonymous]

Buying 100,000 shares of Enron....

[Anonymous]

Voting for Ken Cuccinelli for Virginia AG!

[Anonymous]

Developing a drinking problem and getting smacked with a DUI when I was in the military. Pretty much ended that career. Things worked out in the end but I always wish I didn't do that to myself. The shame and embarrassment was just awful to experience.

On the plus side, I would have been dead or severely aged by 50 at the rate I was going. So maybe I needed a wake up.

[Anonymous]

I regret listening to my gynecologist when she told me that the problem with my nipple was definitely just eczema. Two years later, I've been diagnosed with Paget disease, and if it had been caught earlier, my prognosis would have been better.

[Anonymous]

Getting married and having kids. I studied voice in college and wanted to be an opera singer. I was so stupid thinking I could do marriage, motherhood, and musical career. If only I could go back. I have drummed it into the heads of my three children, pursue your dream and do not get married or have children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I regret not communicating better, taking more risks, and not being note astute at people and politics. I also regret finding this website.

I agree about finding this website.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Losing my virginity at 14. Wish i hadn't, but I also don't blame myself for this. I blame my parents. they NEVER talked to me about boys, sex, pressure, drinking, drugs. None of it. And they shouldn't have let me go on car dates with a senior when I was a freshman.

Time to move on.

[Anonymous]

Looking back at my life, I don't have a ton of regrets and this one seems kind of silly in the grand scheme of things, but I definitely regret the high school I went to. My Catholic grade school fed into mainly four high schools (a public HS, a co-ed Catholic, an all-girls Catholic, and an all-boys Catholic) and I chose the public one because most of my friends were going there. Well, fast forward to freshman year and they all found new friends and I didn't (I was shy), so I was pretty much a ghost my entire high school career...I went from a class of 50 to a class of 700 - it was easy to just float on the edges at such a big school. I definitely think I could have been a different person going into my adult life had I gone to the Catholic school that had more holistic approach to educating its students. (Seemed like at my school, as long as you got OK grades no one cared)

[Anonymous]

Being crazy with a boyfriend after we broke up. I think he was my soulmate and had I not acted crazy and hateful we would have gotten back together.