Life's choices

Well, I'm young, but the best descion I made was reading the World Of Sophia by Jostein Gaardner, it introduced to my life & gave a me great perspective of what life's about, & probably the worst to spend money in things I don't even use / that some I have lost already.

Btw, I would love to hear from the experiences of you guys, I wanna learn from people who have lived a lot already.

Hi Dux, Thanks for your post. I thought it died and went to heaven as soon as I gave it birth. LOL. Looking forward to hearing from others. c.i.

c.i.- As Jack Benny would say, "I'm thinkin', I'm thinkin'!". Actually, if one is to take this thread very seriously, it could be an extremely heavy one, especially for those "of a certain age".

The young folks have lots of time to redirect their courses, the rest of us don't. Personally, I think it is an excellent thread....... I just don't know it I am ready to deal with it yet!

Dag! How old are y'all? I'm in my 40s, but I sure as hell feel as if there could be other major choices to be made. In other words, I feel far from over with.

snood, Forty is still young - depending on what life decision you wish to make. Our oldest is 39, and he completed his master at the University of Texas in Austin last December. He's still unsure where he wants to settle. c.i.

This is a very difficult question to answer, and many of the answers that come to mind are too private to post here.However, the biggest mistakes I've made have been over a long period of time, like not taking college seriously as an undergraduate, and being with the wrong guy for 6 years of my life that I could've spent growing in more constructive directions.

I was a big risk-taker when I was younger, and there were many mistakes and brushes with extreme danger. I'm thankful now that nothing terrible happened, it almost seems as though I had a guardian angel watching over me.

The biggest mistake I ever made was allowing myself to be ripped from the womb, but then again, I'm a nihilist....oops, wrong thread...hee! Actually, I'm still learning, so the final verdict is out for now.

In 1965 I enrolled in a jr college. But I got caught up in the anti war movement and civil rights activism and quickly dropped out. I don't regret my choice, but I feel I would have gone a different direction had I stayed. There are many things we think we would change about the past, but, would we really be free to make the choice, given who we are and the ramifications of change?

dream, When we're young, most things are "too personal" to share on a international forum. As we age a bit, we become a bit wiser, and understand that most people have secrets in their closet. When you get as old as some of us on A2K, most of our inhibitions disappear, and we're willing to share most things we have experienced in life - both good and bad. It's a matter of what you're comfortable with. My attitude now days is, so what? I'm not ashamed to share with the whole world that I've always been the black sheep of the family, and that's only the beginning. Besides, nobody really knows who you are or where you live. Share a little. c.i.

I have, and probably always will, regret more the things that I could have done and didn't, than the things I did that didn't work out so good.
( Course I have regretted a few of the things that I have done also!!!)

akaM, You needed to be more persistent in your pursuits. You would have found out if you really would have regreted not doing them, but learned from them. The other possibility was that you may have succeeded. c.i.

hi ya all: i feel pretty comfortable with the major choices i made in life. got a reasonably good education; most of the kids i grew up with in germany during the 1930'3 and 40's didn't make it past public school - followed by starting in a job as an apprentice -; i got my highschool-diploma. getting married at age 26 was right for me - shortly thereafter we left for canada - it was perhaps the most important AND BEST decision we made. and being able to retire from fulltime work at age 55 turned out to be a kind of stroke of luck(even though i did enjoy my job). soooo ... no regrets! hbg

My biggest regret was my marraige and yet I've got an amazingly wonderful son. Our children make it hard to regret our past. Heard that in a movie once, and it's true!

CI - I've said the same thing to our children mant times. At their ages (20, 17, 15) they have all the big decisions to make - what to study - what career to choose - who to marry, etc. At my age (47) about the most important decision I have to make is what shirt to put on in the morning.

The best decision I ever made was to marry my wife. I'd do it again in a flash. My biggest regret is my behavior as a late teen and young adult, when I should have known better. I hurt and used people, and have no excuse for that.

My dream as a child and teenager was to be a fashion designer. After graduating high school, I was accepted at the prestigious Parsons School of Design in NYC and attended but because I was young, immature and in love with a boy back home, I couldn't get my head together for the experience and stayed for only one semester. I have always regretted that and wondered what my life would have been like if I had graduated from Parsons, stayed in New York and embarked on a career in fashion design? Would I be a top designer, a Donna Karan or maybe one of the Badgley Mishka team? Or not?

My life choices, 38 years of choices, found me on a city bus in Atlanta at 8am on March 2, 1995 where I met my future husband. It's amazing to think that everything, the different experiences, the different men, the breakups and the heartaches, the choices I made, moving to a strange new city on a whim, taking a job that I despised, all led up to being on that bus that morning.

Ain't life grand? It's the best game in town.

I wish I had just stopped & considered further some very impulsive actions in my younger days ...
Yet I wish at other times, that I hadn't thought so damn much about the implications of my actions & just ACTED on what, deep down, I knew should have been done! <sigh>

great thoughtful responses. great thread.

I came of age on a kind of cultural cusp, between an old world, conservative, patriarchal family system that firmly believed a woman's only purpose here on earth is to marry and bear children, and the break-out, blow-it-up, I-can-do-anything liberation of the late sixties. I struggled to exist in both worlds, not an easy thing to do, and though I clearly ached to escape my confining heritage, that proved to be easier said than done.

So, I married into the culture, but somehow managed to get an education which allowed me to stay personally "alive" in spite of the stifling environment.

Had I had a little more courage, and a lot more self-esteem, I could have made choices that might have allowed me to really soar. As many have said above, it's always what you DON'T do that brings regret.

And yet, the choices we make bring us to who we are, and, at this point, the real challenge is to find a way to be ok with who we are.

angie, That's so true; acceptance of self is so important. I think most people set too high a goal for themsevlves that is too difficult to accomplish, and they end up disappointed in their lives. I believe goals must be set in small increments for them to be realized. Trying to jump from ground level to the mountain top is too hard for most of us. c.i.

I find making choices quite exiting, so am never as preoccupied with the result, as with the enjoyment of just diving in and deciding;
However, I must admit I sometimes wonder, what if I had picked a diferent ovum?