[Closed] With hindsight, would you...?

Not sure, I do really enjoy my job and it's easy but I was always interested in science/biology and wish I'd taken that more seriously. Not sure if I would enjoy it as much as what I do now though.

Yes, perhaps learn another language but apart from that I doubt I would be able to change much.

You cannot change the past but you can change the future using your present situation no matter how hard that can be.

🙂

What chewk said - yes, I might've, but I am where I am, so now's the time to make the most of it!

not really, no.

as Edith Piaf said, je ne regrette rien

You cannot change the past but you can change the future using your present situation no matter how hard that can be.

Of course, I do wonder though with what I know now would I have made all the same decisions in life. To be honest, they're mainly personal decisions for me (I'm not worried that I might have made a fortune following another path for instance). I've definitely found out who I can and can't rely on, and been let down more than my fair share of times. What would I have changed? Don't know, maybe to have had less expectations on friendships/relationships, just cos I've got a very strong moral compass doesn't mean everyone else does... Or something like that!

Now... Who's got Friday's Euromillion's lottery winning numbers? 😉

mboy - Member

Of course, I do wonder though with what I know now would I have made all the same decisions in life.

Probably yes but perhaps slightly different. The more you know the further you go but the further you the tougher the problems you will face. They are set of problems you will encounter at different level. If you were a simpleton then you would face problems related to simpleton but if you were gifted then you would face the sort of problems for gifted person. e.g. trying to find out how universe come into being. At each level you will encounter the problems for that level. May it personal, moral etc.

Euro jackpot will solve some of the problems but then another set of problems will surface. The cycle never ends.

🙂

Not sure. I mean, I make decent money now but that's the only reason I do this job. And I suppose it's fair to say the crap years were laying the groundwork for this, so they've paid off, but it's not really the future I'd have chosen- bit of a road to mediocrity in all honesty.

So sure, work for the weekend but you're a long time at work. I had a brush with interesting, rewarding work a while back but it didn't pan out, and even though it was a fair bit less money and some big downsides, I wish things had gone that way.

On the whole I enjoy my job and am happy with it.

However 20 years ago I had just been offered a promoted post when I was also offered a stint on a Greenpeace ship. after much soul searching I took the sensible job and whilst not regretting the choice I do wonder what would have happened if I had chosen to go with greenpeace

Yes, yes and yes. I am currently going through a particuarly vile bout of soul-searching and wondering what the past few decades have been about - I have a big mortgage, a small pension that reduces in value daily and seemingly negligible job prospects.

Ah well. Probably just need to cheer up a bit.

Not too many changes. I think I'd probably have explored the options a bit more when I started work but 60 quid a week, well that's something you can hardly turn your nose up at.

I'd have moved away from technical stuff and into management sooner too I think. I was offered plenty of opportunities when I was younger but ignored them. In hindsight that was a poor decision and has restricted my career a little but I don't really regret it, just part of the experience.

I have one major regret when it comes to my career path. A few years ago I was offered a position as a Deputy Editor of a fairly big publication. I was thrilled at the time but the whole 'working in London' thing put me off plus the 3k bill for a year long pass for the train.

I turned it down. I've regretted it ever since. It was an opportunity that won't present itself ever again.

I enjoy what I do now but it's far from being a Deputy Editor of a magazine. My biggest regret in all of this is that in order to fill the void of having an exciting career, I seem to endlessly search for hobbies and sports to do, things to buy etc. Not great.

Hell yes. 10 years ago I walked out of a stupidly well paid job because I thought I wanted to do something different. Turns out the job was the least of my problems and the 'something different' has died with the economy. So now I'm out of work and can't even get a sniff of a job, let alone a 'career'.

Career wise no, but reckon my life would have gone in a totally different direction had the term 'MTFU' existed 6 years ago and I'd done something I've regretted not doing ever since. No chance of rectifing it either. 🙁

In the words of the great Beth Orton...

[i]What's the point of regrets?
They're just lessons you haven't learnt yet.[/i]

On the whole, I am happy with my lot.

(although I would have consume less pies, cheese, chips, red meat, butter, beer and wine between November and May while I was injured - I think I was kidding myself that any weight gained would drop off once I started training again)

Yes, I wish I had become a doctor but my Dad was a GP and I had a silly idea of making my own way in life and not wanting to be accused of following in his footsteps or taking advantage of his position. I road ride with a physician and I envy him for his knowledge and ability to cure people who are suffering.

But on the other hand I speak three languages and travel around Africa on business so I have a breadth of experience and tolerance that he doesn't.

The only thing I would change really is to give up on being a manager earlier.

I am a good bedside nurse, I am a crap nurse manager. It took ten years of struggle and stress to realise this

...and the physician envies you for your linguistic talents and stories of travel in far flung places... 8)

No real regrets as I wouldn't be myself had I not taken a few knocks and made a couple of mistakes on the way. I'm sure I'll make a few more, but it's all part of growing up.

I don't care: I fill my life with love.

Nope, but I would have been more engaged and assertive in the process. Maybe then the band would have been more successful and longer-lasting...

I got offered a job aat Porton Down, but couldn't take it as it didn't pay enough extra to move my missus and the kids down South, mortgages etc. 😡

Ten years later, we've split up and are both living down South anyway 😥

Still, life takes its positive turns - through the vicissitudes of fate, I get paid to talk to people about bikes all day 😀

Woppit tonight:

I'm trying to do just that...
Never really enjoyed anything since leaving the Army.
Just feel lost, and really struggling to find my way, worryingly as I'm late 30s and no idea which way to turn.
Being at home on the sick has kinda made me realised just how crap it's all become. 😳

I've sort of drifted through different jobs and ended up as a bit of jack of all trades - very useful for the job I'm doing now (bit of project management, bit of mechanical/product design, bit of electronics, bit of supply chain management, bit of tech sales), but it makes it difficult to see where I would go if for some reason I lost this job.
I regret not having a core skill or qualification, something to define my career by, I guess.
I blame my O level Maths teacher, it later turned out I was actually quite good at maths, and could have studied mech design at uni after all...

I have done lots of jobs, but only now in my mid 30s, am I training for my career.
I do regret not doing it sooner, it would have been much easier, but then I also think that everything happens for a reason.

There are many things that, with hindsight, I should or should not have done. However, anything job related is way down on that list. Not that I'm living the career dream, my job is a job, it pays pretty well, it's not too stressful, it's probably a bit dull and I could maybe be more 'fulfilled' (whatever that means) doing something else, but it's just that it's not that important in the grand scheme of things.

Yes and No would have done stuff a little differently and taken a few more chances with certain things.

But it's pretty good at present 😀

Wouldn't mind. Problem is, two of them are dead...

[b]Mr Woppit[/b] - Member
Wouldn't mind. Problem is, two of them are dead...

i was applying for a forestry commission grad scheme, where it was 1st come 1st served for interviews - applications opened at 9am, my computer broke at 8.55am.

i was doing a relevant degree, was very interested in forestry, and felt i had a good chance. i was totally gutted.

i often wonder where i'd be now if i'd got that position. certainly life would have been a lot different.

other than the money, i'm sure my current life is actually better in many ways, so it's not a regret, it's a 'what if...?'

Whilst working as a lab assistant in a new york university, with hindsight, i regret irradiating that spider and leaving it for one of the high school kids to find as I would have really enjoyed being a super-hero.

I'd have done Phsyics, Chemistry, Biology and Mathematics at A-Levels and then gone into Medicine...... instead of doing Geology, Geography, History and Politics....winding up hating them....and then doing a foundation year in science at university leading to a Biomedical Degree.

I was 16 though when I chose.....

However I guess it's made me more well rounded academically.

Hell yes. 10 years ago I walked out of a stupidly well paid job because I thought I wanted to do something different. Turns out the job was the least of my problems and the 'something different' has died with the economy. So now I'm out of work and can't even get a sniff of a job, let alone a 'career'.

Sounds like whats happened to me!

In summary, regarding my career i'd do EVERYTHING differently because its been one non-stop tale of redundancies, office closures and general misery, and although some of the work has been very interesting, its just not worth the low pay, job insecurity, and difficulty in finding other (local) employment when the job, and often the company too, inevitably disappears.

Oh ya ... one thing I regret ... I have not invented death ray ... to annihilate entire maggots in a massive way. All those backstabbers, bureaucrats, nosey bar-stewards, PC brigade and all selfish me, me, me. 👿

I have not invented death ray ... to annihilate entire maggots

Quality, as always. 😀

I don't regret much, although I keep on having weird thoughts about becoming a librarian. When I get too old and slow to run around the wards, I might do just that.

There are many things that, with hindsight, I should or should not have done. However, anything job related is way down on that list.

That's a fair point

When I said would you change your career path say, it was just an example. Not specifically trying to dig that out per se, just trying to find out what you might have done differently with the benefit of hindsight (no regrets though of course) in any aspects of your life.

In summary, regarding my career i'd do EVERYTHING differently because its been one non-stop tale of redundancies, office closures and general misery, and although some of the work has been very interesting, its just not worth the low pay, job insecurity, and difficulty in finding other (local) employment when the job, and often the company too, inevitably disappears.

I know how you feel, pretty much sums up my last 5 years or so. That said, what could I have done differently? I think to some extent, the last few years of my "career" have just been a bad luck period, and I am at some point in the future going to be due some luck. I appreciate that you make your own luck to some extent, but then 5 redundancies in little more than 3 years would point to the opposite.

You live and learn.

People need to be content in life and accept that there will only be moments of happiness, some long, some short. Being content is far more important. Taken me about 12 years to learn this.

I've had jobs that have had no possibility for progression so when I couldn't structure a career I tended to buy stuff every week to reward myself for going to work. Weekly cycle of boredom. Living for the weekend.

Then had a near death experience, a fairly long stay in hospital. Cried when I came home and watched the finches we have preening each other. Amazing what I was blind to when rewarding myself with bike bits, car bits, gadgets and other shit that soon becomes obsolete.

Now I'm content to be able to walk my dogs, shred some stoke and don't pay too much attention to the things society used to make me feel like I should be doing. No point in worrying about what might happen.

etc

I very much regret following the career 'advice' from the so called expert at school, who recommended I go to work for a bank, which I hated with a passion and at which I was spectacularly inept!

Should have gone to uni or turned pro (golf BTW and no s****ing at the back) both of which would have been considerably better financially and I ended up going to uni 30 years later anyway 👿

I very much regret following the career 'advice' from the so called expert at school

I wanted to be a marine biologist. My "Career Advisor" told me not to worry about choosing Biology as a core subject at school as it's covered at Uni.

Guess what? I'm not a marine biologist.

Ahh... Careers Advisors, my meeting with the one at our school lasted 5 minutes and ended with her saying 'You know more than me about what you want to do, so go for it'

She also told my mate that there was no way he was going to attain grades good enough at A-level (based upon his GCSE results) to ever be a doctor. He's now a cardiologist.

You live and learn.

People need to be content in life and accept that there will only be moments of happiness, some long, some short. Being content is far more important. Taken me about 12 years to learn this.

I've had jobs that have had no possibility for progression so when I couldn't structure a career I tended to buy stuff every week to reward myself for going to work. Weekly cycle of boredom. Living for the weekend.

Then had a near death experience, a fairly long stay in hospital. Cried when I came home and watched the finches we have preening each other. Amazing what I was blind to when rewarding myself with bike bits, car bits, gadgets and other shit that soon becomes obsolete.

Now I'm content to be able to walk my dogs, shred some stoke and don't pay too much attention to the things society used to make me feel like I should be doing. No point in worrying about what might happen.

etc

I like this a lot.

14 years ago, I walked away from a very high-flying graduate job to start a bike business. I could have been very well paid by now, I could have had a fancy car and a big house, and lots of disposable income.

But I wouldn't have been me.