Groundhog Day A Time To Learn To Serve, Not Regret?

Dan Pink’s “No Regrets Is No Way To Live” in WSJ argues the anti-Regret movement is an “unsustainable blueprint for living” & instead of denying the inevitability of our downers we should learn from them to “lift us up.” Ok. But, do we lift only ourselves? Or, do we accept Sir Walter Scott’s ending reserved for a narcissist?

As Mr. Pink noted after years of study: “… we cannot tattoo over our regrets (I even heard from someone who regretted his ‘No Regrets’ tattoo & was removing it.) We’re hard-wired to experience them. And the reason for their ubiquity is their utility. Regret doesn’t just make us human; it can also make us better.”

Ah, there is the rub as Bill Murray’s character in “Groundhog Day” found out: Doing the same thing over & over gets the same results, good or bad, unless of course we learn from them & do something constructive with that acquired knowledge ... perhaps for the betterment of mankind, even if in some very small way. And, in so doing, we can have a better chance of avoiding Sir Walter Scott’s bitter ending so many self-centered folks are doomed to endure & to regret: “The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.”

Davd Soul