Pearls: What could have been
EDITORIAL MUG: Matt Pearl
Someone dear to me spoke a few of the wisest words I think I have ever heard. They’re not my own, but they’re too good not to share.
‘Thinking about what “could have been” is the worst thing a person can do. Lots of lives have been ruined because people do that very thing.’
Wow. Now that’s wisdom on the best level: it’s obviously the truth, and it’s presented with clarity and urgency.
The nature of time itself should eliminate these types of thoughts, right? We learn so early in life that we cannot live backward, that time only moves in a singular, forward direction. We know almost intuitively that we can never go back, that we don’t get to erase and replace a bad decision with a good one. We know, but we still allow ourselves to view the present through the lens of regret.
We ask ourselves, ‘What if…?’ as if doing so can somehow alter the past, or reposition the present. It’s ridiculous. But every last one of us ignores the truth of time and at some point will wallow in fruitless (usually self-pitying) wonder.
Most of the time it’s the harmless stuff. Did we buy the right shirt, or wear the best tie? Should I have taken out the trash before getting into bed? Would the other car have been a better purchase than this one? There’s nothing you can do to stop those types of thoughts , and usually there’s nothing particularly important at stake in terms of our happiness or wellbeing, so we let ourselves wonder about what other choices we might have made instead.
Those are not the thoughts my friend was referencing. She was talking about the big stuff: spouses, kids, career paths – basically, the choices that have the potential to bring us the most joy (and often, the most stress) in our lives.
Now I will say that there are probably moments when it’s reasonable to reconsider a big choice. People change jobs. People move to different towns. Sometimes it just makes sense to change your life, and my point is not to encourage anyone to stay miserable for the sake of demonstrating hos or her contentment.
No, I mean approaching the present with something akin to a gambler’s mindset, desiring to spin the wheel and see if you can do better. Or like Jay Gatsby in the F. Scott Fitzgerald’s book, living by a plan designed to recapture an elusive past. You’ll just find out what Jay discovered, folks: the past is elusive, and living to erase your regrets can be a dangerous way to sabotage the present (and future).
My could have been is a car accident. My father and I could have stopped for lunch with my uncle, and we might have avoided the crash. I could have reacted differently to the collision and perhaps avoided my father being injured as he was. In that altered reality – one that does not, and cannot exist, I know – maybe he and I work together at the newspaper longer, and he could have retired more on the schedule he and my mother had created.
Maybe. Could have. Might have. They’re illusions, each of them. But in moments of fatigue, anxiety or other such emotions of darkness, I have been known to ponder on each of them. And you know where those thoughts lead me?
Nowhere. Because I live in the present, just as it is. My mind might believe it can take a walk through a changed reality, a might have been dream, but my life is here and now.
I work to avoid the could have done and should have been avenues or thought as often as I can. I’m happier in the present when I reject such feelings and delusions. And you know what else I have learned?
I’ll never see the brightness of the future if I mire myself down in regrets for the past. This is fact.
Matt Pearl owns and operates The Tri-County Ledger.
