Shamelessy inspired by the 'working on a cruise ship' thread, what is your greatest regret in life (relationships aside as I am sure there will be a few of those).
Mine - at the end of my final year at art college I had a job offer to work in Milan at the Italian edition of Vogue magazine but I turned it down as I wasn't confident about going to live in another country. What TF was I thinking!
Its not really a regret but sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I had taken a different fork in life when I was offered both a professional job that took me to Edinburgh and also place on a greenpeace ship. I took the proper job.
but I turned it down as I wasn’t confident about going to live in another country.
I'm always impressed by people who live and work in different countries to their birth, something I'd never have had the confidence to have done. Now, thanks to Brexit, I probably don't have much choice...
After uni I was volunteering at the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology one day a week for experience. They offered me a job and an offer of an MSc. I had just paid for my chainsaw tickets so I turned it down.
Nae regrets though, I made a choice at the time.
Marrying my first wife to 'do the right thing'. PTSD for life
Leaving aside wanting more time with my father before cancer killed him (because you can never have enough time), I'm not sure I have that many regrets. Maybe starting skydiving earlier in my life, maybe joining the army earlier in life, maybe not doing such a limited degree.... All of those are minor though.
Going to work in my dad's family business straight from school. It was the easy option.
I knew I had a guaranteed job so messed around during last two years of comp and screwed up my exams - came out with two CSE's.
35+ years later and still in the print trade.
Not finishing my A levels. It has restricted pretty much every aspect of my life since.
I've had a few, but then again, too few to mention.
i wish i had got a trade instead of going to uni.
I had just finished my environmental science degree and desperate for money, so I turned down the opportunity for an MSc in environmental archaeology, and went into consultancy.
On many days, I still think about the joys of sitting in a muddy trench rather than the career I have now, Even though I'm an expert in my field.
Oh and drugs, I really regret some of the total carnage my addictions caused in my earlier years.
Funnily enough, while working on a cruise ship, I didn't act, on the now, very obvious advances of a very attractive young doctor.
Chatting to her in a bar, about to make my delayed move and her pager went for a "Code Blue". Doh!
Never got around to it again. I think she gave up.
Not sure what she saw in me mind!
About 10 years ago Jerry offered me a commission only job at Frog Bikes. Didn't dare take it, so stuck with my environmental sales job. Wonder where i would be now if I did.
I really regret my drug use during the 90's.
I should have done more
I’m always impressed by people who live and work in different countries to their birth, something I’d never have had the confidence to have done. Now, thanks to Brexit,
Yeah, it's funny.
I wouldn't change anything about my life (not that it's been fantastic but it has made me who I am now so do I really want to be a completely different person?) but I do sometimes wish I'd spent more time living in my hometown (Glasgow).
Of course, I wouldn't have had anything like the same experiences and opportunities but there is a lot to be said about laying down deep roots in a place and the relationships that are built up over decades.
I have no real regrets, but there's two points in my life where I have "what if?" moments.
When I was 18 I was seeing a Canadian girl who was 6 years older than me and was set on going around the world. She asked me to join her on my gap year after I'd finished a-levels and I didn't, and I have no idea why, really.
Then, when I was struggling with the unfathomable-maths-course-with-good-PR that Engineering degrees are, I saw an advert for Whistler Mountain, basically begging people to come and work there in pretty much any capacity as the resort was just starting to take off (1995). Again, I've no idea now why I didn't just go.
edit: oh, yeah, if someone had possibly considered the idea 35 years ago that I might be slightly autistic, that would have been extremely useful.
After A levels had the money for a round the world air/inter rail ticket. Spent it on dope.
also Gwen and fit Claire on a beach in Almeria. Passed out pissed on the sand
and not doing the British Antarctic survey placement at uni
buying the dilapidated shit pile money pit I am now sat in
Frederique, Pas de la Casa, early 90's.
Right before I dropped into teaching (safe but dull) I was offered an opportunity by a Design consultancy I'd done some work for. To take a quite cool product (prototype had been in a Bond film) they had on the back burner and turn it into a company initially operating within the consultancy building. I'd have been everything - designer, manufacturing engineer, organised the manufacture, assembly, marketing, sales. The lot. Only snag - there was no pay, just 50% of the profits and it would have been 18months minimum before they'd have been any. Sadly I'm not from a background where bank of mum and dad would have supported me to live during that time so said no.
It would have undoubtedly been a ball ache, I'd have been exploited taking all the risk, and probably it would have failed but what I'd have learnt about running a business would have changed the course of the rest of my working life.
I wish I’d worked harder at school. Not because I didn’t do well, I did, well enough to get into medical school. But I messed around a lot, and missed an opportunity to learn things that I’ll never get again.
All my other “regrets” aren’t really regrets, because I’ve learned from them. Plenty of mistakes made, but few enough repeated that on the whole I’m in a much better place than I’ve ever been.
I sort of regret not trying harder/revising harder/working less whilst at school. I was working 3 hours a day before school by the time I was 14 and so was already tired by the time revision in the evening came around. I've achieved a lot despite poor results, but I wonder what I might have done had I not delayed myself, but had things happened differently, family, job and other things likely wouldn't have happened.
A trivial one - I had the chance to buy a bargain 2008 M5 Touring when I finished Uni in 2010 (low miles, silverston blue with white interior - £21k)- I won the auction and then chickened out. In my head, it would've been immense, but in reality, the engine/gearbox would've likely bankrupted me.
I had the chance to buy a bargain 2008 M5 Touring
Similarly, I nearly bought a Mk1 Toyota MR2 - it was from someone I worked with, she didn't want too much for it and it was 100% pristine. I pulled out when I found out what the running costs were like (IIRC it was about £1k just for a new exhaust).
Can't pin it down to one! I've got a good life now, but I know I could have done so much better in lots of things if I'd have not been so ****ing lazy and taken a few opportunities. I just don't seem to have the confidence to go for it.
Should have done better in sports as well, never really played a team sport and I think that affected th amount of friends I had when I was younger, and the way I interact with people now, again a confidence thing. Team sports are great for confidence building.
Sadly I’m not from a background where bank of mum and dad would have supported me to live during that time so said no.
You can't leave it hanging like that though...... what was it / are you the STW equivalent of Ronald Wayne, who decided that it would be a ballache trying to set up a new venture with Jobs and Wozniak and sold his 10% stake for $800 12 days after it started?
Not going to university.
I went to a rubbish comprehensive in the 70s. Massive classes, full of disruptive kids, taught by (with a couple of exceptions) dejected and unmotivated teachers. My naive mindset at the time was 'if this is education I'm not sticking with it for a second longer than I have to'. I left at 16 in 1980 with a handful of O levels.
I went to an Army apprentice college for two years studying for a technical trade. I then went on to have a full and rewarding army career, commissioning from the ranks toward the end of it. Along the way I did a lot of specialised tech training and and quite a few OU courses.
I have no regrets about my career path but just wish I'd delayed it for a few years for A levels and university. For the experience as much as the qualifications, I'm imagining there was a lot more shagging and recreational drug use than in an all male military college!
I do carry a mild inferiority complex about not going to university. Of course when I left school it was relatively rare, rather than being the norm as it is now. It's not a big concern and I'm mostly comfortable with who I am and my life choices. I took early retirement, am happily married after 37 tears and have two brilliant (university educated) Kids. I'm very lucky and don't take it for granted.
But as you asked, it's probably the one thing I would have done differently.
Swerving around an overweight cyclist wandering across the road in Central London while on a large motorbike, missed him and managed to stay on.
#johnson
I am not a big fan of my decision to quickly clean the conservatory roof to please the wife before rushing off to buy a Maserati.
I never got the Maserati but I did get 6 months in bed to think about the decision while the doctors decided whether to amputate the foot or not.
You can’t leave it hanging like that though…… what was it / are you the STW equivalent of Ronald Wayne, who decided that it would be a ballache trying to set up a new venture with Jobs and Wozniak and sold his 10% stake for $800 12 days after it started?
It would be a good (if depressing for me!) Story if someone else took it on and became a millionaire off the back of it! Sadly not - it never went anywhere. It was a subaqua sled - basically took air previously used by the diver and used the energy left in it to run some little thrusters. So you held on to this thing and slipped around (quite steadily) underwater. I think similar things exist now, but not sure if any use the same propulsion methods. It would make far more sense to use the lighter compact batteries available in 2023 and use leccy for your propulsion.
Definitely missed a few opportunities with the opposite sex due to completely misreading/not reading the signals.
I wish I'd kept up playing the piano with any degree of aptitude.
Can't complain about much else though, if I'd paid more attention during my A levels I'd have gone to a different uni and not met my wife so while that would have been very different, not sure it'd have been better.
i was at a car auction in the late 80s or early 90s and a 3 door sierra cosworth went for 4.5k. i could have rounded up the money if i had wanted to.
I regret not committing to becoming a pilot because at 18 I would have had to take out a £60k bond to pay for it with no guarantee of a job afterwards.
Instead I went to university for 10 years and became an engineer. 23 years later I still want to fly and am finally in a position to get a private pilots licence in the next couple of years
basically took air previously used by the diver and used the energy left in it to run some little thrusters.
Are you talking about using a divers exhaled breath to turn little turbines?
Don't think that would ever of worked, it would really mess with controlling your air consumption.
I have a rather long list.
Didn't see my RAF application through when I was young - what could have been, eh
Not dealing with my anxiety/depression sooner - will regret that for the rest of my life
Getting into over £25k of debt in my 20's. Ruined any chance of financial stability and independence for most of my 20's and 30's
Not being better in school and college, so I ended up in my current career almost by default.
Probably a few more on top of those.
One that would be high on my list is living in Southampton for ~30 years and not discovering the South Downs lanes on a bike until six years ago. For as long as I can remember I've always had at least one bike, often a road bike, but it was extremely rare for me to ride besides for a purpose (commutes, popping to shops, popping to friends' houses etc.).
Really missing just simply getting out to the likes of Old Winchester Hill ridge this year, nevermind chasing my times up the climbs, due to long covid.
Getting sent to borstal for a fighting incident when I was 19.
It cost me a very promising professional rugby league career.
Stupid young men eh.....
FFS!! We’ll all chip in to develop and build a time machine for you!
None. I have the most amazing life ever. Anything that don't lead me to exactly here and now would be devastating
no major regrets.
I kind of wish i had taken fewer drugs at uni and worked harder (I got a Desmond)
Not sure how much it would have affected my subsequent career path (being a musician/DJ), mind. I am lackadaisical and easily distracted, but fairly bright (sometimes wonder about ADD). So maybe it's not realistic to think i could have done much better anyway. I dunno.
I also wish I hadn't caught COVID in April 2020, which turned out to be the single most defining aspect of my life ever since. But it's not like I did it deliberately...
The hurt I've caused a couple of people close to me. One in particular.
Turning down a job offer in the US, I'd just met my first wife.. Turned out to be an abusive relationship in which I turned to alcohol and drugs to survive it. Some good things did come out of it. I have a daughter who is more grounded then I ever was at that age.
