The Things That Linger Long After
Regret comes in many forms, some more poignant than others. Sometimes it’s loud and sharp, like the memory of saying something cruel during an argument. Other times it’s a quiet ache, a dull reminder of past decisions that bubble up to the forefront when you can’t sleep. We all carry a few of these regrets, whether they’re about people, time, or missed chances. What’s odd is how often the same themes appear across lives, like a chorus we never asked to join. Here are twenty of the most common things people regret.
1. Not Traveling More
There’s always some reason not to—be it money, your career, a fear of flying. Yet when you ask older people what they wish they’d done, this one comes up again and again. They say they wish they’d taken that trip to Italy before their knees gave out, or that they regret skipping the road trip with friends because of a summer job in their youth.
2. Working Too Much
Whole decades can blur into commutes, deadlines, and late nights in office chairs. The irony? Nobody remembers the quarterly report you stayed up until 3 a.m. to finish—not even you. Children remember, though—who was at the school play, who wasn’t.
3. Not Saying “I Love You” Enough
It’s not just romantic love but the platonic love we feel toward our parents, siblings, or best friends. Sometimes the words feel corny or heavy, so they’re saved for birthdays or hospital rooms. Later, people regret holding back, as if love needed to be rationed out.
Daniele La Rosa Messina on Unsplash
4. Staying in the Wrong Relationship
Everyone knows at least one person who stayed five years too long with someone who was toxic for them. Sometimes it’s fear of being alone, sometimes inertia, that leads us to waste time with someone we know is wrong for us. These wasted years stack up, and you can never get them back.
5. Worrying Too Much About What Others Think
The high school version of us never really goes away completely. Even when we’re older and going gray, we sometimes find ourselves worrying about our outfits, jobs, partners, and social media posts. Half the people we fret about impressing forget our names within a year, yet we allow ourselves to be bent out of shape by this pressure.
6. Missing the Chance to Learn Something New
It may be an instrument left in its case or the watercolor kit we bought but never opened. You tell yourself it’s too late to learn Spanish at 40, or piano at 50, until suddenly 60 arrives and you realize it was never about age—it was about the sense of initiative that never came.
7. Not Spending More Time with Parents
Even complicated family dynamics aren’t enough to undermine this desire entirely. Regret looks like wishing you’d called more, sat longer at the dinner table, asked one more question about their childhoods. One day the house is empty, and the chance is gone.
Tamara Govedarovic on Unsplash
8. Letting Friendships Fade
Let’s be real: everything has a season. Not every friendship is going to last a lifetime. First it’s distance, then schedules, and finally, silence. Regret is finding an old photo of the three of you at a concert and realizing you haven’t spoken in eight years. Nobody had a big falling out; you just drifted apart.
9. Caring Too Little About Health
As you get older, you realize that health is the most valuable commodity you have. Eventually, you realize that skipping checkups, eating poorly, or ignoring the back pain that never quite goes away compounds into a larger problem. There’s regret in realizing some damage can’t be undone.
10. Being Too Afraid to Speak Up
Remember that meeting where you had the great idea but stayed quiet? Or the time you wanted to defend someone but froze? Regret here isn’t about being in the wrong—it’s about knowing that, had you spoken up, it might very well have changed everything.
National Cancer Institute on Unsplash
11. Not Saving Enough Money
It’s not a glamorous regret, but it’s real and gritty. Blowing paychecks in your 20s feels fine until an emergency arrives and there’s nothing to fall back on. Regret comes years later, when you wish you were retired but you’re having to bag groceries instead just to survive.
12. Being Unkind
We’re not talking about dramatic betrayals but the small moments of mean-spiritedness. Maybe it was a sarcastic jab you thought was funny but wasn’t, or walking past someone in need of help. These small moral failures feel like splinters in our memories.
Intricate Explorer on Unsplash
13. Not Taking Risks
Sometimes playing it safe feels easy, but this too can come with regret. Maybe we rejected the job in another city or decided against starting our own business. Maybe you never found the courage to ask out that person you truly cared about. Regret doesn’t always mean failure—it’s the ache of never knowing.
14. Ignoring Creativity
It could be painting, writing, building, or baking. Whatever form your creativity takes, these artistic endeavors tend to get shoved aside by “real life.” People regret not making space for it, like denying themselves the richness of greater self-expression.
15. Not Keeping a Journal
Memory is a slippery thing, and it’s easy to forget even the most meaningful moments. People regret not writing down the little details—the smell of their grandmother’s kitchen, the way their kid said “aminal” instead of “animal.” Those things often fade unless caught on paper.
16. Comparing Too Much
Comparing ourselves to others is sometimes unavoidable. We can’t help but scroll through someone else’s highlight reel, wishing our house or body or life looked like theirs. Later, regret comes on strongly when you realize how much joy was drained by not simply focusing on your own path.
17. Giving Up on Fitness Too Soon
People often imagine it’s all or nothing. Miss a few workouts, and the whole routine collapses. Regret is realizing 15-minute walks would’ve added up to years of better health, if only they’d been kept.
18. Not Apologizing When You Should Have
Some doors close forever. Pride can keep you from saying sorry until the other person is gone, or simply done waiting for you to make amends. In this case, regret can last a lifetime, reemerging every time a particular name gets mentioned.
19. Settling for “Good Enough” Too Often
It can be a job that’s at best tolerable, or a cramped apartment that simply gives you a roof over your head, or a relationship that isn’t great but isn’t awful. Regret gathers so slowly you sometimes don’t even realize you’re unsatisfied, until one day you realize you built an entire life on compromises.
20. Forgetting to Have Fun
Yes, fun. Silly, wasteful, pointless fun. People regret not dancing at weddings, not playing in the snow with their kids, and not ordering dessert because they were watching their waistline. It may sound insignificant, but years later, those missed bits of joy loom large.
