How to turn regret into clarity for a self-empowered life

Achieving clarity is a pre-requisite to living a self-empowered life. But what is clarity? It is knowing how you want to live.

One way to find clarity is to understand what we as humans typically regret; it helps us create a more enjoyable life, because we make more conscious decisions to avoid experiencing these regrets.

One of my favorite authors is Daniel Pink. In his latest book The Power Of Regret he talks about four core regrets.

Foundation regret is about not being responsible enough. ‘If I had only stopped smoking before it was too late,’ or ‘If I had only put a proper retirement plan in place when I was younger.’

What we often regret is not what we did, but what we didn’t do. The chances we didn’t take, the opportunities we let slip. This is Boldness Regret. The skill you didn’t learn, or the business you didn’t build.

We experience Moral Regret when we know we took the low road, despite better knowledge. We could have done the right thing, but we didn’t.

And Connection Regret is about the relationships we messed up. The friendships we let die or the loved ones we didn’t spend enough time with. Sometimes it’s not too late and we can still do something about these relationships.

The worst thing we can do is to claim that we don’t have any regrets. Exploring regret is a massive opportunity as it helps us grow.

I regret that my first marriage failed. By admitting it I empower myself to build happier and more fulfilling relationships today. I learn from past mistakes and make better decisions in the future.

How do you use regrets to empower yourself?

Main Image by Nate Dumlao on Unsplash