Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names. – John F. Kennedy We can’t turn back the clock of time. Good or bad, right or wrong, it is done. It’s over! Once the ingredients are mixed, we can not separate them apart. Once a word goes from our mouth, we can not take it back. Once we do an action, we can not choose another one in its place. Once wood is reduced to sawdust, you can’t make it back into a board Once Humpty Dumpty fell, all the kings horses and all the kings men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again Once today arrives, it becomes too late to live in yesterday Despite the fact that no one can not refute the obvious statements above, it is not uncommon for many of us still finding ourselves reworking yesterday. As a psychotherapist, I am struck by how many of my clients can not seem to leave the land of “if onlys” and “woulda coulda shouldas.” For those clients, yesterday prevents them from living fully in today as guilt, regret and hindsight makes them so much wiser. They cannot forgive themselves for not “knowing better” at the time. If only we knew everything when we were four! The good news is that there is an alternative to the emotional paralysis of, “I should have known better-itis.” Instead of wishing you had known better and kicking yourself that you didn’t, how about giving yourself a second chance? There Are No Do-Overs…But There Are Second Chances
