Should've, would've, could've...

Source: ainiemos.blogspot.com

 "I have many regrets, and I'm sure everyone does. The stupid things you do, you regret...if you have any sense....And if you don't regret them, maybe you're stupid." Katherine Hepburn

How many times have I told myself I should have done things differently, I would have done this if I had that, I could have changed the situation if I had acted differently? If I'm honest, probably as many times as I blinked.

Regret is one of the last remaining demons I'm still fighting off, although it's creeping up less and less now. I learned about making peace with the past so I let go of a lot of the stuff I resented myself for. Yet sometimes when the stress and exhaustion take their toll on me and I find myseld emotionally unbalanced, I end up doing something stupid I then blame myself for with damamging effect to my soul. And it's worse every time because I should have known better.

Some people find refuge in drinking, others in drugs, some take comfort in eating,  others steal things, or pick up fights, we all have our way of dealing with the world when we feel weak and frustrated.

I seek men's attention. That's what I do (a psychologist would probably say it comes from the fact that I lacked my father's attention when I was a child). But I am unaware of the fact that this is what I'm doing and mask it up by thinking I've fallen in love with some guy and convince myself he must be the one. At first I blame them, when things go wrong. Then I blame myself for picking the wrong men. Then I blame myself for not knowing how to behave around men. Then I blame myself for being too emotional. Then I blame myself for lacking patience... Then... Then I start all over again.

The other day, I came across a message from the guy who dumped me without telling me, four months ago. It was an old message I hadn't read at the time. It was an appology. For being cold because he had been in a bad place emotionally. He told me I deserved better.  Turns out I am not to blame for this one after all. Because, I did blame myself for it. Plenty. For being to impatient. For making a scene and wanting to know what was going on, rather than just relax and don't care. For having been too keen, too eager, too open. For never saying the right things at the right time. For accepting to be ignored. For not accepting to be ignored. For seeking recognition from outside of myself. For everything I could think of. I was to blame.

Then I thought about this a bit more and realised I have been blaming myself for everything all my life. Because my mind needed a logical explanation to why things have gone wrong and eventually I would find it in something I did or didn't do. And the next time I tried to be better, act wiser, be different. But somehow it always went wrong and I would come up with more things to blame myself for.

But I'm tired of blaming myself. I'm tired of regret, I'm tired of covering temporary wounds up by seeking more attention from men who give me none. But I'm ready to make the most of my regrets. To accept them and make sure there's no more 'should've, would've, could've' going on in my mind...Because sometimes things just happen and we do our best with the knowledge and the skills we have at the time. We keep correcting course until one day things do go well. Because that's just how life is.
  
"Make the most of your regrets...To regret deeply is to live afresh." Henry David Thoreau