Chaplain’s Corner: Do Not Let Your Regret Define You

We all have regrets. The thoughts of what we “should have” done instead of what we did, often nibbling at the corners of our minds as we fall asleep at night or when we find ourselves in a reflective mood. Joan Chittister, in her book The Gift of Years, speaks of the two faces of regrets: the regret of our failures, and the regret of our life choices.

Regretting our failures is a painful thing, but it also is a sign of growth. Whether it is injury we have caused to ourselves or to others, realizing this harm is a reminder that we have grown and matured. If the circumstances presented themselves again, we would choose differently, because we are no longer the person we used to be.

Regretting our life choices is just as common, but not as healthy. Chittister writes that this type of regret is a temptation that “entices us to lust for what never was in the past rather than to bring new energy to our changing present.” There are many ways to fullness in life, all of them different, all of them unique. To regret the paths we did not choose is to miss the gratitude for the path we have chosen.

Paul functions as a good model for this. Formerly a persecutor of Christians, Paul, through his growth in Christ is able to acknowledge the regrets of his failures from earlier in life. And yet, he does not let these life choices define him. In Phillipians 3:13-14 he writes:

“Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

Let us allow our regrets to remind us of the people we have become while resisting the temptation to let them hold us back from the people Christ is calling us to be.
– Caley Ortman, Sierra View Homes Chaplain