Title says it all really. What’s your 3 biggest regrets and, if you feel like sharing, why?
In no particular order, I’ll list mine and add my reasons later if anyone is interested…
[ol]
[li]Not having gone to college directly after graduating high school.[/li][li]Not having lost my ‘virginity’ much earlier.[/li][li]Not having given up on my religion as soon as possible.[/li][/ol]
You?
Life’s too short to spend on regrets.
Sinatra, is that you? 
No I am not bitter about my grad school experience, why do you ask?
Not overcoming my math phobia, and having been unable to major in a technical field in college.
For a non-technical field, having chosen German language and lit. I think at the time I would have said I was learning about my ancestral roots. What I didn’t know was that German cultural presence in L.A. would virtually dry up in a few decades, due to the end of any significant German immigration, I would never be able to work in or emigrate to Germany, and that the dollar would collapse so it would always be too expensive to visit. Thirty years on, I think that what I really believed, deep down, was that if I learned German, I would become like many people that I was meeting at that time, who traveled there frequently, or lived there off and on. But no. Those people all had an “in”–family ties, dual citizenship, or whatever; without that it’s pretty damn hard just to move into a country and make a living there, even if you do spend years and years immersing yourself in the culture and language. My stepdaughter, who moved there a couple of years ago and will likely stay, also has an “in”–she’s been promised the down payment on an apartment in Berlin from the estate of her recently deceased uncle. She also frequently takes advantage of the strong Euro and travels abroad. Like my former fellow students, her good fortune is a happy accident of birth. Frequent travel–like property ownership–apparently skips generations in my family. 
Not having played with other musicians more, when I was younger. On the other hand, I really did try, but either my prospective bandmates weren’t doing the kind of music I wanted to do, or else I wasn’t good enough.
Going to the state college to be with my SO, instead of the big name school that also accepted me.
Taking niacin pills for my cholesterol that probably damaged my liver.
Trusting my business partners who ended up squeezing me out of my own company.
That I put so much pressure on myself to get good grades in high school at the expense of a social life.
That I stopped taking dance lessons in elementary school.
That I wasn’t kinder to my younger sister and brother when they were small and actually wanted to spend time with me.
Not going to college after high school.
Marrying my ex.
Not sticking with guitar the first time I took lessons at age twelve.
You know, just trivial stuff.
I came in here to mention math. With only 7 posts, I was sure I would be the first.
I have taught myself not to regret things. I have been very successful at that, and learning the lesson of ‘no regrets’ makes for a much freer life. But the fact that I never learned the kind of math that would help me understand the science of life and the universe better…it is a bitter pill that one…I still regret it.
I can’t say I have any real regrets, as such, which seems to imply a certain degree of dwelling on past mistakes, but there are certainly things that I’d do differently if I were suddenly teleported back into my 11-year old self and had to live life over again. Most notably:
I certainly can’t complain about my life overall, but I think these changes would have made it better/more interesting.
I like that attitude. I do have regrets, but I try to frame them in terms of learning from my mistakes. My three:
I would have taken up math at a much earlier age. I wouldn’t have been a math genius, but it would have helped pass the time in junior and senior high a lot more productively.
I would have trained in at least one technical skill such as car repair or electronics.
I would have left the house directly after graduating high school, moved across the country, and concentrated on sinking or swimming in the real world before going to undergrad. Going to college directly after high school when I only had vague ideas about the future was a mistake.
I’m pretty philosophical about regrets. There are thousands of paths that one’s life can take. Therefore, I suppose I have loads of “the road not taken” regrets, but am happy with my life. I don’t think the two are mutually exclusive. For instance, if I hadn’t married my first wife, I never would have met my second one either.
Going to, and staying at, that horrible little 8th rate college for all the wrong reasons.
Becoming obsessed with that one guy. I made his life miserable and now he’s dead. I came to regret my behavior pretty early on when I think about it, but never apologized.
The hideous wedding gown with everything gross on it, including a butt bow.
Wow. I see I’m not completely alone. And although I used to be pretty philosophical about this sort of stuff and actually refused to even see them as regrets per se, in the interim life has kicked the ever-living-shit outta me so that, what the hell? 
Anyway, it’s reassuring to see that in between some pretty major ones there are still plenty of more ordinary things.
I’m glad we’re not all dying over it.
But I’d like to further ask those that have responded… do you have regrets that are newer than the ones you listed, but that would’ve been eradicated completely if the former hadn’t ever happened? In my case, that’s a definite yes. The religion and virginity bit were all tied up together and if I could’ve kicked them (so to speak), it would’ve allowed the third to happen normally. Then some of the other really bad stuff that came on later might not have ever seen the light of day.
Does that make sense or do I need to go report back into the “talks too much” thread?
Sure, in that if, for instance, I had dated more in high school and college, then the regrets I have about my first marriage wouldn’t have happened because I probably wouldn’t have married her in the first place.
But this all has an element of Monday morning quarterbacking, IMHO.
Of course. Isn’t that the whole nature of regretting things in the first place? What can I say, it’s been a particularly bad day and got me to thinking…
Perhaps I should go do something else then.
Yeah, pretty much how I feel. I would have:
A lot of shit has happened in my life, but if that stuff hadn’t had happened, who knows where’d I’d be now. It’s an oversimplification to say that hardships have made me a better person, but they’ve definitely become a part of who I am.
I keep trying to come up with three, but throwing out two because they’re similar. Maybe I’m too young to have three, but it all boils down to one giant regret:
1,2,3: Having too much Social Anxiety to do anything outside of school with friends since ~6 years ago.
I have very few friends email addresses, I don’t have a myspace/facebook etc. No phone numbers at all and I’ve never so much as seen a movie or screwed around town with another person since the first semester of 7th grade.