The True Measure That You Have Grown

Have you heard or read this:

What would be one advice you would give to your younger self?

What would be one thing you would want to change in your past?

and the other plethora of past questions.

The day your answer to these questions would be NOTHING.

That is the day you would have truly grown.

Regrets…

It is the chalice of sorrows we keep hidden in our minds.

But why do we regret?

The simple answer is because we cannot accept.

It is the adult version of throwing a tantrum but that tantrum is thrown by you and thus, has to handled by you.

Of all maladies in the world, the worst ones are those which we create for ourselves.

Clean your mind space of your regrets. Your regrets are as unique as you. Many people have gone through the same thing but none of their experiences can exactly match. The human sorrow is as diverse as human existence.

What should you do from today?

The goal of alchemy is to make gold.

The goal of personal development is to make a better YOU.

While gold may seem a dream, but a better YOU is a possibility every day, every hour and every second.

With every tick of clock you change, your experience gets added in. But, then, it is your job to digest and assimilate the good from it and throw out the bad.

Your mind should emulate the digestive system.

You first break down your experiences, then, use your unique perception to derive the lessons from it and eliminate the future regrets from it. You finally absorb the lessons and forget the regrets.

This is constructive forgetting, which should be always doing. You are proactively eliminating future regrets. Live life with no regrets is a constant effort and not just a line!

Keep the good, throw the bad.

When you start doing this, you eliminate your future sadness and agitation and guarantee your future happiness and mental peace.

Now, let’s deal with the past.

How to transmute past regrets in lessons?

Every single day, take out some set amount of time to introspect upon your regrets.

Take one each day. First, write it down. Now, play Finding Waldo with your experience and look for the positives/lessons you can get. Once you have extracted the positives/lessons, write them down. There is no need to focus on the negatives and dwelling on them. They don’t add value to your life, so, don’t go looking for trouble in the paradise of positives you are trying to create.

I understand the proclivity of the human mind to look for negatives. So, you have to make a concerted effort to not focus on negatives. It will be harder for the first few times but you will learn. A good technique to not focus on negative is to counter it with positive, as soon as your mind tries to focus on the negative, look around for more positives/lessons or revise your list of positives/lessons.

Once you have extracted all the positives/lessons from your regrets, it is time to let go finally. This is the final line you write:

Thank you for teaching me. I release myself of this regret.

Write it three times, take three deep breaths and revel in the calm you have created for yourself.

This has to be a constant practice.

This is like removing toxins from your mind.

There will finally come a day when there would be none to work with.

That is the day your answer to the questions about the past will be:

Nothing, I am perfect as I am. I won’t change a thing.

Life is meant for those who love it, so, weed out the regrets and then, plant the seeds of long-lasting bliss.

Abhishek Verma is a researcher in the field of deep learning and artificial intelligence. He likes to write about the logical way of self-improvement. Spurred by emotions, he also likes to write poetry. Stay in touch by joining his newsletter. Follow him on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Mix.