As a perfectionist, I am extremely tough on myself for making any kind of mistakes. No matter how big or small, no matter how new or old. Not being able to forgive myself holds me back in a lot of things, but it also stays in the back of my mind as a hopeful deterrent against repeating the same mistake. One thing I hardly ever agreed with was an ‘eye-for-an-eye’ behavior. “He/she started first” doesn’t mean a lot to me, because if we repeat what the first person started then how are we any different from them? Yet, I have left myself do the exact same thing.

I have faced situations over the last 5 (or 10) years that I had no idea how to deal with. I doubt anyone in my situation/age would have. Many decisions I have made are regrettable, out of inexperience. Most of those mistakes were meant to fix things or make things better, but without experience or knowledge there is no way to know if the decision is right or not. Yet with the level of expectations I have of myself, I do expect myself to know how to handle every situation. It is physically impossible, but in hindsight not being able to handle something perfectly eats away at me.

When I hear a problem, my goal is to fix/solve the problem. Complaining about a problem without trying to solve it makes no sense to me. But sometimes one must listen to the complain without offering solutions right away. Sometimes people just want to be heard. I wasn’t (not sure if still am) good at that. But one thing I also learned in counseling – how long do you listen to same complaints where no meaningful action is being taken? At what point do you become an enabler for others who want to feel better by talking it out, without taking the tough choices of changing their situation? I still don’t know the answer to that. Because I still see myself as a problem solver.

If another thing I would change, it would be to learn about mental illnesses at a younger age. I wish for a world where we would all learn about it in college. Because mental illness is too stigmatized, because those suffering from it are blamed for it or judged for it, and too many are criticized for being ‘crazy’ and not being able to get the marbles together. We never make those comments about any other organ. Yet for inexplicable reasons we don’t even remotely give the same respect to the most complicated object in the known universe – the human brain. I have never been prejudiced against anyone with a mental illness, but I certainly wish I knew better to handle it around those who might be suffering from some kind of mental illness. Sometimes good intentions don’t always produce good results, because of our ignorance of the steps that would produce good results. That is definitely one of my biggest regrets, yet I don’t know how I could have ever prevented it. Some situations come out of the blue and there is no way to be prepared for it. And by the time you are, too much damage might be done and there would be nothing left to fix.

And that brings me to the last point. Because of other people’s actions/behavior, we sometimes lose respect for some people. I think respect is earned, and no one is entitled to it. But even if we lose respect for someone, we should be ultra careful that we never even inadvertently disrespect them. First of all, disrespecting someone knowingly is extremely wrong and mean-spirited. When we have respect for someone, it shows in our actions. But when we lose it, we might not know how our actions might not always be respectful. Let’s say we have been mistreated a lot. That doesn’t mean we can do whatever we want and tell ourselves that “it is all going to end the same way, so why should I make any extra effort to be nice.” Maybe the other person who was disrespectful or mean wasn’t doing it on purpose. Maybe they can’t help or control their behavior without professional help. But if we can control our behavior, it is our moral duty to never disrespect anyone knowingly, and do our best not to disrespect them unknowingly. If our actions become a little careless because we aren’t watching our behavior closely, it is better to build a distance so we don’t disrespect or hurt someone, than to stay at the same place and inadvertently disrespect them. As this point, saying “but they have done it a billion times worse” is not an excuse.

These are some of my mistakes I wish I can take back. Sure, we learn from experiences, but sometimes getting that experience might be too late. But we can never learn about every single issue in the planet? So what do we do when we experience something we have never seen before? What do we do that by the time we figure it out, it is already too late? Life doesn’t give easy answers, does it….