by Kristina Dukoski

Editor’s Note: This piece was the winner of the APA Blog’s first Public Philosophy Award for Undergraduates.

“A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.”

― James Joyce

I was sitting in a dimly lit Starbucks with a friend, immersing myself in the scent of strong coffee and the musical stylings of whatever Mumford & Sons knock-off band was being played on the system. We were lightheartedly recounting our memories from high school when I noticed her get misty-eyed and pensive. “I remember being a ‘mean girl’ in high school,” she said. “I mean, not in the typical ‘Hollywood’ sense—subtler, but equally as damaging. There was this girl whose parents made her oil her hair to maintain its health, so it was always stringy and gross-looking. Everybody made fun of her, so I thought it was okay to do so, too. I would talk amongst my friends about her, calling her ‘oil well,’ ‘grease queen,’ whatever came to mind. I was indifferent then, but I regret it now. I wish I hadn’t participated in that.” Her eyes were full of reflective sincerity.

If you’re like me, her sentiments strike a familiar chord. I have so many regrets that I couldn’t count them on both hands. I regret every failed relationship. I regret unjustified harms I committed against others and myself. I regret foods I have eaten. (I’m looking at you, liver.) I regret fashion and style choices I have made throughout my life, because now I have numerous photos of myself that make me cringe so hard that Karl Lagerfeld feels it. Indeed, it seems that regret is so ubiquitous amongst us humans that anybody you stop on the street on your daily commute would have at least one regret.

Though we use the term “regret” in common parlance, it is unclear what exactly it is. The prevalent idea is that regret is inherently bad: People want to live in such a way that they don’t come to have regrets, and if they already have them, they want to be rid of them as soon as possible. However, is regret necessarily this big, bad thing that we think it is? I can conceive of three ways regret imposes on us: There are those who let themselves be consumed by their regrets, those who overcome their regrets, and those who do not have regrets—cue Edith Piaf’s “Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien.” While the first two can be good or bad, it’s only the third that is always bad, because if I claim that I have no regrets, it does not mean that I haven’t done regrettable things, but just that I haven’t reflected on them or taken responsibility. Regret can be carried in different ways, kind of like an article of clothing can be carried differently by diverse bodies. If only overcoming regret was as easy as removing a sweater.

Upon reflecting on the concept further, I notice that regret can take two forms: regret of what we did—call it commissive regret—and regret of what we did not do—call it omissive regret. For example, a mother who regrets deserting and estranging her gay daughter would be an instance of commissive regret, since she regrets the things she said and did; on the other hand, a distraught man who regrets letting life pass him by without telling the love of his life that he cherished her would be an instance of omissive regret, since he regrets failing to do that which he could have done. Although these two examples are extreme, the particular regrets that belong to either class fall on a spectrum, ranging from trifles to tragedies.

Commissive and omissive regrets are similar in that both involve a recognition of alternative outcomes or ways in which we think our lives could have been different, or more precisely, better. This recognition of a better state of affairs is what gives regret its characteristic bitter flavour. However, these regrets differ both structurally and morally: they are structurally different in that commissive regret pertains to a regrettable action, while omissive regret pertains to a regrettable omission of action. They are morally different in the following way: One can learn more from reflecting on regrets of what they did do but should not have than they can from reflecting on regrets of what they did not do but should have.

Commissive regrets manifest because people that suffer them have enough evidence to believe that their life would have been better had they not done what they did. Consider the example of the mother and daughter: The evidence that supports the mother’s belief that her life would have been better had she not estranged her daughter is that she loves her daughter, her daughter reciprocates this love and she knows it, and she agrees that her life would have been fuller and more satisfying if her daughter was in it. Thus, the mother has enough evidence to suppose that, had she not estranged her daughter, her life would have been better. Likewise, a person who regrets having spent the previous evening binge-drinking is confident in believing that their current condition would be better had they not drank so much, given their evidence that the amount of alcohol they consumed was enough to make them sick. On the other hand, regarding the example of the distraught lover, the man does not have enough evidence to suppose that his life would have been better had he told his love that he cherished her. The number of possibilities for what could have followed are more numerous and less predictable: she could have rejected him, they could have been incompatible, and so on.

Given the significance of evidence in the case of commissive regrets, they serve to teach us how to comport ourselves in the future. If we take stock of how our actions negatively affected our lives, or more specifically, how our lives could have been better for us if we hadn’t committed some action, regardless of how trifling it was, we can determine how to avoid putting ourselves in less-than-ideal circumstances. Evidence plays an informing role: The more of it we have and the stronger it is, the better equipped we are to make accurate judgements.

Along with helping us make better decisions in order to achieve better outcomes, regret is useful to us in that it allows us to morally assess ourselves: In regretting, we reflect on the undesirable outcome and accept our responsibility in its actualization. As such, if I do something that results in an undesirable outcome, but do not regret it, I have failed to take the opportunity to improve myself.

None of this is to say that it is easy to live with any type of regret, as regret is a salient reminder of our fallibility. I am suggesting that we should not seek to stifle our conscience and turn away from our mistakes but learn from them in the interest of becoming better people.

Kristina Dukoski is an undergraduate philosophy major at the University of Toronto Scarborough.