Whenever I contemplate the question of whether I have any regrets about my life, I remember the commercial (I do forget what they were selling) in which a scene comes up with a rough looking character getting the finishing touches on a tattoo that states “No Regerts”. Ha, I wonder!

But, seriously, folks.

Over the past several months I’ve had three separate and unrelated conversations in which a mentee, a coaching client, and a younger peer, asked me if I look back and have any regrets about my life. And, if so, how do I deal with them? My responses were consistent, and went something like this:

“No, I have no regrets. Of course, when I look back, I am sorry for some of the things I have done, and I would do them differently. But I’m human so I know that if I were able to go back and avoid those mistakes, I would just make different mistakes. And who knows where those mistakes would have led? I love my life, my family, my church – and all of that is a result of having lived every day of my life to this point in the way it’s been lived.”

In honest reflection after those three conversations, I had to ask myself if I was just rationalizing my past mistakes with this answer. Should I regret some of my past choices and actions, thinking that my life could be even better if I had chosen differently? It is tempting to think that way, for sure. I kept coming back to the idea, though, that living with regret was just a pining for a better life that could have been. That seems the opposite of being grateful for the life I do have.

Then, God.

Last month, I scheduled an extended time of prayer one afternoon. This is something I used to do more regularly when my schedule was more complicated, and felt I was being drawn to do it again. I sat myself under a pavilion in a local park, opened my journal, and asked the question I always ask at the beginning of these sessions, “What do you want to talk about today, God?”

Among other topics, one of the agenda items that came up was to go back and do some deeper study on a scripture passage I had read earlier that morning. In the middle of that study, going to a cross-reference somewhere else in scripture, I read this:

“For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret. . .“ – 2 Corinthians 7:10

Do you see the progression? I would have liked to have done some things differently, but what I did caused me to feel godly grief (sorry), which in turn produced a repentant heart toward God, which led to salvation WITHOUT REGRET. I would not be where I am today (saved) were it not for the mistakes I made. So, no regrets, I just move forward.

It is a gift of God to live without regret. I probably should get that tattooed somewhere visible.