There are few things more sought after than a life lived without regrets.
And since there are so many confusing notions around it (like, what does it look like for me to practically “follow my bliss” or to “live life to the fullest?”), let’s dive in right away and get you set up for success as we explore this topic!
What it’s not
Before we go into what it truly looks like to live without regret, let’s touch on what it does not have to look like.
It does NOT have to look like overcommitting yourself to a hundred different goals at once, which often leads to half-assing a bunch of it until you burn out.
It does NOT have to look like a Tim McGraw song where you throw caution to the wind and use your savings to ride bulls and adventure-seek across the country.
What living without regret looks like is different for everyone.
And honestly, it’s less about what you go after with fearless abandon and wayyyy more about the sh$t you let go of with fearless abandon.
It’s about aligning yourself with your highest self and trusting that once you do, everything else will fall into place.
The best you that you can be
Whether or not you feel like you know what the best version of you looks like, I’m telling you right now it’s your natural, unencumbered-by-the-world state.
So, you don’t have to BECOME anything, actually.
You already are that.
You just have to remove the blockages that are keeping you from showing up as that person.
And there’s where most of us fall off the track.
There’s this misguided idea that you have to work really hard and take a whole bunch of external actions, keep specific habits, achieve life goals, etc. to become your best self.
When really, untangling yourself internally will have you following your dreams and living without regret as a natural state of your being.
Starting the untangling process
American nun and meditation badass Pema Chödrön said, “You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather.”
Living without regret requires you to stop trying to control the darn weather and just be the sky already!
Even though this concept might feel confusing at first, it’s actually pretty simple.
It’s essentially saying that nothing impermanent is part of who you are.
So, the first step to clearing blockages and entering a natural state of regret-less flow is to disidentify with the temporary parts of your life.
For example:
“I am not my job. I am not my relationships. I am not the number in my bank account. I am not the 15 lbs I want to lose. I am not this memory of embarrassment or that memory of abandonment.”
Once we quit trying to make these things part of who we are, a new us will start to emerge.
And it will happen automatically if we can just give ourselves permission to be the sky instead of the weather, however stormy it might look right now.
Then we can take a step back and start to allow new opportunities, ideas, and creativity to emerge.
So, if you feel stuck right now, I’d look into just how many things in your life you’re holding onto with a vice grip thinking they’re part of your identity instead of holding space for the possibility that there’s a better opportunity waiting around the bend, begging for you to embrace it.
Next week, we’ll dive into some more actionable items to live from the permanent parts of you (your highest self)!
