One thing you would do differently

As we approach the end of the year of our Lord 2023 AD and we look back on our whole lives, if you could change one thing or one decision you have made, what would it be?

@divegeester
i would have stayed in the army.

i would have never gone to law school

i would have never bought the house in the oquirrah highlands.

i would never have sold my 51 chevy car, my 53 chevy truck or my 56 chevy belair

@divegeester said
As we approach the end of the year of our Lord 2023 AD and we look back on our whole lives, if you could change one thing or one decision you have made, what would it be?

a new year's resolution from 1974

@divegeester said
As we approach the end of the year of our Lord 2023 AD and we look back on our whole lives, if you could change one thing or one decision you have made, what would it be?

If we change one thing, we would change a chain of consequences - too complicated.

@divegeester said
As we approach the end of the year of our Lord 2023 AD and we look back on our whole lives, if you could change one thing or one decision you have made, what would it be?

Buy tech stock back in the 80s.

@divegeester said
As we approach the end of the year of our Lord 2023 AD and we look back on our whole lives, if you could change one thing or one decision you have made, what would it be?

I sometimes think about what an interesting life I might have had if I'd remained in the frontier town in Irian Jaya [later West Papua] after my three years there. It went from about 55,000 people in 1991 [when I lived there] to about 450,000 in 2017 [when I last visited it]. It would have been interesting to witness and play a part in that growth. Sometimes I ponder it but it never rises to the status of regret.

I should have swallowed the red pill.

@torunn said
If we change one thing, we would change a chain of consequences - too complicated.

Yes, still, there could be an initial bad decision that sparked the chain of unforeseen consequences.

I wouldn't have run away from home with my boyfriend at the age of 16.

@suzianne said
I wouldn't have run away from home with my boyfriend at the age of 16.

That's what I mean. If you hadn't, it would have changed your life and the lives of many others. Difficult to single out one particular occasion, one mistake leading to the next.

@torunn said
That's what I mean. If you hadn't, it would have changed your life and the lives of many others.

And I would now be a different person because of that.

Better or worse? Who knows?

Bad experiences also teach us. The famous school of hard knocks.

I know I would probably not be on the trajectory I am on now.

@suzianne said
And I would now be a different person because of that.

Better or worse? Who knows?

Bad experiences also teach us. The famous school of hard knocks.

Who knows, but you did what you thought was right, I would guess.

@torunn said
Who knows, but you did what you thought was right, I would guess.

He was 25. I dropped out of school to run away with him. It was literally the worst decision I ever made.

What doesn't kill you makes you weaker.

@divegeester

I would never, EVER have started smoking and drinking cider at 14!

I’d not have felt so low in mood, would have spent my lunch money on a school lunch and thus had the brain power to work a whole day at school instead of hanging around the park most afternoons smoking cigarettes with my other moody, truanting friends.