Lessons learned

I am currently immersed in a phase of introspection. Lately, I have found myself in difficult situations and certain difficult events have stood in my way. Not very long ago, a person told me the following: ” There are a lot of things that we can’t control, but the only thing that we can really control is our actions. ” Ironically, a few months later, this same person seriously hurt me.

However, this sentence is stuck in my mind because lately, I have regrets.

I regret some of my actions taken over the past few months, towards loved ones and towards myself. Not that I am a bad person but I was not the best of me and it took time for me to realize that. Usually, we all have moments of regrets but for me, the difference today is that I question the place of regrets in my life. People often claim that we shouldn’t have regrets but I have a problem with that. Who’s never done something wrong and regrettable? Who’s never mentally reexamined their actions?

For me, someone who feels regret finds themselves in a stage of questioning. I’m not talking about the act of overthinking but more about this feeling of being in front of a mirror and realizing that my actions expose me to who I am. I want to use my moments of culpability as a strength. Honesty with myself gives me the opportunity to look back and redefine some personal basics and even boundaries for myself. Learning from our regrets ultimately allows us to learn about ourselves, to revisit our past selves, and to imagine other things for us.

However, the most difficult thing to overcome is my inability to let go – that is, not letting my guilt get the better of me. I am learning to accept my faults and to be okay with the fact that I cannot change the past. I learn to do less violence to myself by sitting down with my emotions without judging myself too much. I constantly seek to approach this ideal of myself that it is difficult for me to accept that the person I was (in those moments ) did not know how to act otherwise and that nothing is final.

Ultimately, the goal is to accept that I am growing through this duality, the good and the bad of me are essential in the process of being closer to my best self. Here’s to not devaluing my experiences of yesterday and understanding that these times are a necessity for the lessons learned.