I’ve been thinking a lot about regret. I came into 2026 saddled with the weight of every mistake I’d made over the past year. My 2025 was marked by a peculiar overflow in my life, an abundance I’m not all that sure I was prepared to steward. My shortcomings in the face of this abundance led me into the new year feeling as though I’d squandered it all. Everything. As though all that was “meant” for me had gone up in smoke.

I don’t think I can reason that out. Is my life over? NO. So why do I feel as though these “missed opportunities” have spelled the end of my promise?

I think some gratitude is in store. I live in a good neighborhood. Yay. I have a wonderful, beautifully imperfect, family. Double yay. I’m soon to graduate college with the expectation of attending graduate school. Triple yay. I could go on and on. Perhaps that’s the antidote, some much needed emotional and material inventory.

This might be one of those slow-working antidotes, because the weight of my shortcomings feels heavy still. My external and internal temperatures are operating out of wack and yet, I must march forth regardless. I carry with me my multitudes!

There’s something sobering about that. As I navigate my campus, there’s seldom an individual, in whatever capacity our paths cross, that is experiencing the world in binary. Regardless of what their prospects are, those very individuals likely harbor regret in abundance. Regardless of the amount of love in their life, there’s likely a relationship they feel they missed out on. Regardless of whether or not that job was right for them, they probably feel some type of way about the time that they spent there.

I think that’s what I’m processing right now. I reserve the right to be resolved to the experiences that have passed me by, while still holding space for the hurt of that loss. I stopped working at Chick-fil-A 4-and-a-half years ago and there are still things I know I could’ve done better during my time there! I don’t plan on pursuing a career at Chick-fil-A. I wholeheartedly believe that I was meant to leave that position when I did. However, my multitudes (!) allow room for that unrest to persist. In fact, I can harness it. I can even employ it to fuel my pursuits in the present-day.

That embarrassing moment from back in the 7^th grade that keeps you up at night, maybe you don’t need to “get over it”. Perhaps it could be useful. Even if it isn’t, it purports to be here to stay, so that path of coexistence appears to be the way forward.

I’ve wasted too much time ruminating on things I could’ve done better. I’ve lost even MORE time feeling some type of way about not being over that sense of regret. So right now, I resolve to surrender that tension. I resign to willful hypocrisy.