To whom would you like to go back in time and say 'No, I won't!' or 'Yes, I will!'?

No one got me to do anything.The decision to date Psycho Bob was all my own.
I regret it as much as I regret sticking a hair pin in the electrical outlet. Ow ;)

I am a “I’ll try anything once” kind of guy but I have done some real dumb things in my past and wouldn’t do any of them ever again. Frankly I am lucky to be alive.

No details will be given – but I wish I had been old enough to stop my abuser from abusing me.

Obviously, everything I did or didn’t do in the past led me to where I am today, which is a place I’m ecstatically happy and grateful to be. But I do remember occasions when fear or whatever kept me from doing something that I see now would have changed my life—perhaps for better, perhaps for worse. For example, when I was working for a newspaper in New York, I was offered the chance to move to Paris and work for the paper there. I didn’t, and I’ve often wondered what that move would have meant.

I wish I had said “No, I won’t” to my Psycho Bob before I went out with him.

I wish I hadn’t quit a particular job in order to show solidarity to a fired co worker. It was a position I didn’t know the value of then and I’ve not had a shot at it since. I’m sure my life would have been very different as far as my financial security and independence but at the same time, I wouldn’t have come to know my current fiancee.

Before I ran away with my first husband, my father offered to send me to a college on the beach in California – as opposed to the college I went to in Iowa for a year. I should have said yes.

If I could, I would’ve said, “No” to additional schooling and “yes” to my desire to get out there, see the world, and gain more work experience.

My vice principal in high school. I wish I’d said “Yes and yes”.

In my junior and senior years, I was rarely in attendance, due to extreme anxiety (though I didn’t figure out that was the issue for years). One day, he called me at home (during school hours, naturally) to chat with me about my life. I was 17 years old and I worked two jobs, attended night school (in a vain attempt to get the credits I needed to graduate), paid all my own bills and rent to my mother. I had also been an A+ student before it all went downhill. Given those factors, he advised me to drop out of high school immediately, then take my GED and go straight on to college. He said, “Lisa, you’re living an adult life already, and you’re very bright. Just skip this part and get on with it!”

Well, I took half of his advice… I dropped out. However, I hated school so fucking much by that point, that college was completely out of the question for me. I just went right to working full time. Oh how I regret that decision. I still don’t even have a GED. :/

@Austinlad, your question has set me to pondering, and I’ve come to the following notions:

I view my life’s journey through a lens –– a lens that continually changes based on the experiences and perceptions I encounter along the road. At times, that lens is crystal clear; at times, it is fogged by love at the happy end or by fear/betrayal/rejection at the other end. Both extremes are life-changing, or at least, lens-changing. That lens, which can deceive me, can also put things into sharp focus. As I look back, I will always have a different view than was possible in the moment, as my lens is “different” now.

I also believe, and I’m certain many disagree, that we need to take off our lens sometimes and “just do it,” as the Nike marketing machine would say. While everyone has experiences in their life that perhaps aren’t readily fixable, many things that we commonly view as impediments to personal progress are nothing more than foggy or ill-fitting lenses. We can’t change the past, but we can certainly improve the future. You’re living proof of that!

All that waxing philosophical is to say that there is not one thing I would change in my past – even the most horrific of experiences – because each has led me to where I am today. Would I love to go back in time and express more happiness and love in any moment? – you bet. Would I want to be braver in any given moment? – most assuredly. Will I spend one more second pondering the past? – only if it puts my lens into sharper focus.

As you look through your love-filled lens now, I know you look forward to a wonderful life ahead, and I hope you ditch that rearview mirror. ;-)

@Picante, Lovely. I could not agree more. And thank you for that last sentence.

“it’s someone who got you to do something you now wished you hadn’t, or something you now wish you had done.” ok; so this has to be a PERSON who got us to do something or a something that kept us from doing what we now wish we had done? Wow; those are a lot of years to look back on with regret. Let’s see….most decisions I made myself, tragically….I wish I had gotten a Masters’ Degree and used it for some period of time thus keeping myself from now feelling like a dope….I won’t tell about that one…..I really can’t think of a person who “got me” to do something I didn’t want to do. I’m drawing a blank. I wish I had been much nicer and more complimentary towards my parents and kids. I wish I had gone on the Around the World cruise they offered in Sun City. Now just too much time in Walmart wears me out. I wish I had known how much dogs tie you down. I adore them but is it worth it?