Looking back, what would you have done differently?

[_Canucklehead]

I like this thread, because I often think about this very question.

Mostly I wonder how my life would have been different had I not gone on a mission and wasted two years of my life while my my wife waited for me. Certainly, had I known back then what I now know about the church, I wouldn't have gone. However, that would have had consequences on my university choices when I got back... and I'm not sure that, currently, I would be happier with those decisions than the ones I utlimately made.

Definitely, one thing that I would have done differently is our wedding. I would not have been married in the temple and thereby excluded my wife's family from participating fully. That is one thing that I regret to this day and wish we had never done.

[_KimberlyAnn]

Looking back, I'm sure we would all have done some things differently. What would you have done differently?

KA

Hello KA,
I am mostly a lurker on these types of forums and seldom post, but for some reason your post resonated with me. As I read your post a deep sorrow welled up inside of me. It was quite unexpected and it was sudden enough to be startling. I don’t think I fully understand the emotion yet, but I believe it has much to do with a sense of loss. The loss of youth, the loss of what might have been a loss of potential that was never used.
In my case, maybe it is also the sense of waist. I didn’t sacrifice my precious youth on anything as noble as defending my country or assisting the disadvantaged while in the Peace Core. I spent two years of my time and money selling a lie. I took my Mission Presidents council as being inspired and married within six months of my release. My first child came nine months later. I spent the next decade living in poverty while trying to go school and at the same time supporting a growing family. I was taught it was a sin to limit your family.
I never went on the study abroad program, and I didn’t take the Internship at Washington D.C. I didn’t ride my bike across the country with my friends as I had planned. I didn’t date, and I didn’t backpack Europe. I went to church, I paid the ten percent I couldn’t afford, I burned up hours and hours of my life in presidency and bishopric meetings. And latter, when I woke up and realized that it was all a f**king lie, a overwhelming sense of loss and anger settled over me for several years.
I know it is silly to try and reorder a life already lived, but I am tying in my midlife to make up for lost time. But it will always be a make up effort. The loss is real, and what is gone can never be replaced.

Sunstoned, I feel bad that my post triggered such sorrow for you.

I hope you're feeling better and although you experienced a loss of your youth, I sincerely hope you are feeling happy about your life now. If you're not, it's never too late to make changes for the better.

Best,

KA

[_Ray A]

Looking back, I'm sure we would all have done some things differently. What would you have done differently?

KA

Not that I think these sort of reflections are productive, or even beneficial, but I probably would have married someone else. But at the time we both felt it was right. And when I look at the children I have - I wouldn't change a thing. I believe in fate/karma, and I believe there's a reason why things happen. I could have been rich, famous, and with some extra overtime work from God, even good looking, but I see no point wishing, or even hypothesising, about "another past". I'm sure everyone would, if they could, change things about the past, but would we be any better or worse than we are now? All hypothetical.

I've always liked this quote from Bill Gates: "Life is not fair; get used to it."

If you had done all of the things you now wish you had done, you might have got tired of it all - and become a Mormon, or a nun, or a Buddhist. I think Barrel is absolutely right - the grass always looks greener on the other side.

[_Nephi]

I carry only one regret, and I doubt there was anything I could have done (in hindsight) to keep from making the same mistake again had I had my whole life to do over again. At the age of 19, my hero, my idol, my father passed away of a massive heart attack. I can't say that I didn't expect it to happen some day. He was overweight and smoked a pipe (inhaling it no-doubt). But the shock to my system was massive.

I was in college at the time, and this happened the Saturday before thanksgiving that year (1996). For years after this, I always observed his death day on that day of the year (the Saturday before thanksgiving). The initial shock wore off about a month after the fact, but my concerns turned toward my mother. I am her only child, and Dad dying signified to me that she was totally alone. That summer I moved home from school instead of staying away from her.

On top of this, I came to realize that materialism held no value, and so I changed majors from computer science (which I went into because its very lucrative), to music (cello major) after that summer. In the stages of losing a loved one, I got stuck somewhere between denial and acceptance... ...for almost 10 years. I didn't really start to like Thanksgiving and Christmas again until my first born was about 2 or so.

In hindsight I spent way too much of my energy worrying about my mother and almost no energy on myself. Although I am very appreciative of changing majors (I met my wife in the Music Department), I have since failed to become an accomplished musician and have started back on my computer science degree. Here I am, 30, without a single college degree to my name. Because of how I dealt with my father's death, I am severely lacking in many ways at this point in life.

[_Blixa]

Not that I think these sort of reflections are productive, or even beneficial... but I see no point wishing, or even hypothesising, about "another past". I'm sure everyone would, if they could, change things about the past, but would we be any better or worse than we are now? All hypothetical.

I've always liked this quote from Bill Gates: "Life is not fair; get used to it."

While of course we are dealing in total hypotheticals, I DO find these sort of reflections productive and beneficial. Why? Because they help me sort out how I feel about where I am now.

I started out my response with a similar point about "mootness," but then found the following thinking and writing helpful and useful in terms of looking carefully at the past and trying to learn from it. Some current frustrations and disappointments are thrown into sharp relief that way and assume a much smaller stature when sized up against the entire 51 years. Some problems that currently seem insurmountable also reveal possible resolutions when seen from a different angle like the possibilities of "what if."

Not being able to change the past is one thing, not realizing that you can change your relationship to the past is another thing altogether: this is the insight and "cure" of both psychoanalytic theory (on an individual scale) and the study of history (on the scale of all of humanity).

Like pretty much everything owned by Bill Gates, that pithy faux-wisdom is likely stolen, too. It's far too conventional and commonplace a position statement of those who have the lion's share of the earth's resources to have originated with him.
It counsels against change: accept your lot in life, don't ask why this has come to be "your" lot (what historical forces and material circumstances have shaped and defined this as "your proper place") and thus don't in the process gain the means to change things for yourself and others. I can't imagine a more politically reactionary bit of "common sense."

[_truth dancer]

Hi Sunstoned...

Yours was a very powerful post.

I have had similar thoughts and appreciate your heartfelt reflections.

Like you, it has been difficult to look back at my one chance at life knowing I used a lot of it in ways I regret because of a unhealthy (for me), belief system.

I wish you peace,

~dancer~

[_sunstoned]

Hi Sunstoned...

Yours was a very powerful post.

I have had similar thoughts and appreciate your heartfelt reflections.

Like you, it has been difficult to look back at my one chance at life knowing I used a lot of it in ways I regret because of a unhealthy (for me), belief system.

I wish you peace,

~dancer~

Thank you. I know I'm not alone, and these forums really help.

[_Ray A]

Like pretty much everything owned by Bill Gates, that pithy faux-wisdom is likely stolen, too.

Does it matter? Probably about as much as wishing for a different past, or asking what we would do differently. If I was at the Melbourne Cup in 2004 I would have backed Makybe Diva, not the horse that ran last. If I knew how useless a formal high school education would be to me in later life, I would have left school at 15? Does it matter now?

It's far too conventional and commonplace a position statement of those who have the lion's share of the earth's resources to have originated with him.

I'm sure wisdom can only come from people on $30,000 a year.

It counsels against change: accept your lot in life, don't ask why this has come to be "your" lot (what historical forces and material circumstances have shaped and defined this as "your proper place") and thus don't in the process gain the means to change things for yourself and others. I can't imagine a more politically reactionary bit of "common sense."

Now that has to be a classic misreading.

[_Gazelam]

That teenage girl in love with that "coulda been" guy? That was you. The daughter your Mom raised? That was you too.

Ask your daughters who they think you are, have them write a paragraph for you. that's who you are, and in your husbands eyes your someone else too, And they are all correct.

You can spend a lifetime trying to figure out "Who you are". And just when you think you have it pinned down, its gonna change.

Your better off deciding who you want to be, and working towards that in unrelenting determination. You of cource will have to make sacrifices and brief changes in your course. Say what you want about whether or not the church is true, but it does give you a pretty clear path on how to be the best person you can be. Educate yourself as much as possible, and serve others. You find out who you are by doing those things.

And on a side note, Sam Kinison, who had a pretty strong reputation for hedonistic excess, stated that the only good sex is the sex you have with the person you love. There is a difference between pleasure and happiness. don't let your passions destroy your dreams.

Gaz

[_sunstoned]

Looking back, I'm sure we would all have done some things differently. What would you have done differently?

KA

Hello KA,
I am mostly a lurker on these types of forums and seldom post, but for some reason your post resonated with me. As I read your post a deep sorrow welled up inside of me. It was quite unexpected and it was sudden enough to be startling. I don’t think I fully understand the emotion yet, but I believe it has much to do with a sense of loss. The loss of youth, the loss of what might have been a loss of potential that was never used.
In my case, maybe it is also the sense of waist. I didn’t sacrifice my precious youth on anything as noble as defending my country or assisting the disadvantaged while in the Peace Core. I spent two years of my time and money selling a lie. I took my Mission Presidents council as being inspired and married within six months of my release. My first child came nine months later. I spent the next decade living in poverty while trying to go school and at the same time supporting a growing family. I was taught it was a sin to limit your family.
I never went on the study abroad program, and I didn’t take the Internship at Washington D.C. I didn’t ride my bike across the country with my friends as I had planned. I didn’t date, and I didn’t backpack Europe. I went to church, I paid the ten percent I couldn’t afford, I burned up hours and hours of my life in presidency and bishopric meetings. And latter, when I woke up and realized that it was all a f**king lie, a overwhelming sense of loss and anger settled over me for several years.
I know it is silly to try and reorder a life already lived, but I am tying in my midlife to make up for lost time. But it will always be a make up effort. The loss is real, and what is gone can never be replaced.

Sunstoned, I feel bad that my post triggered such sorrow for you.

I hope you're feeling better and although you experienced a loss of your youth, I sincerely hope you are feeling happy about your life now. If you're not, it's never too late to make changes for the better.

Best,

KA

Your are right. It is never to late to make changes. Leaving the church is the best thing I ever did.