I’ve started transferring all the quotes I’ve written in my journals over the years on to the computer, realising in the process I need to catalogue them somehow in order to find just the right one for whatever subject matter I have in mind. I came across this one which I’d written about eleven years ago on my previous blog; it jumped out at me then, and it did so again.
There’s no if. There is only what is. What was. What will be.
Nafisa Haji – The Writing on my Forehead
That little word ‘if’ carries a heavy load. It can come at the start of an idea, the birth of a train of thought, a motivator to look outside the box and come at something from a different angle. Or it can come in the aftermath of a tragedy or upon reflecting on one’s own life journey, where it either bears the blame for one’s circumstances or is tainted with regret for what might have been.
We’ve all seen and heard stories from whatever is the latest disaster, be it natural or man-made or at the hand of terrorists, where those caught up in the horror who come out the other side either severely injured or mentally traumatised or both, have gone over the unfolding events of the day and pondered “if only I’d caught the earlier train, or later train…” or “if only I’d gone straight to work instead of stopping for a coffee…” or “if only I’d stopped for a coffee instead of going straight to work…”
Somehow, by rewinding the clock and re-imagining the day, they could picture themselves in another place, with a different outcome. None of us have that luxury, but most of us don’t have to deal with such catastrophic consequences resulting from the difference between heading out the door at 7.30 or 7.45.
There are politicians and people in powerful places who have come under the spotlight in recent years for either their appalling behaviour or lack of insight into how their actions or inaction appear in the eyes of us ordinary folk. Prime Minister Scott Morrison attracted the ire of the nation when he was found holidaying in Hawaii while catastrophic bushfires raged on Australia’s east coast just days before Christmas 2019, and not seeming to be in any rush to get back home. And then there’s the current furor over the toxic workplace culture at Parliament House that has found his leadership yet again far from exemplary. As misdeeds and misdemeanors are being exposed all around him, the queue is growing longer every day of people ducking for cover, sending in the spin doctors, trying valiantly to cover their tracks, and I would hope berating themselves with “if only I hadn’t done that..” or “if only I’d done this…” then I wouldn’t be in this sticky mess.
But you didn’t, so you are.
I could probably produce a very long list of ‘what if’ and ‘if only’ decisions which could have changed my entire life, if only I’d made them. But I didn’t, so here I am, just little old me. I’ve lived an unremarkable life, and have wondered at times whether my life might have been very different had I been braver.
…No story worth telling should ever be about blame or regret.
I look back and consider whether many of my choices were the safe option. We all have those moments when we wonder how things would have turned out had we done things differently, said things differently, gone down this career path instead of that one, married instead of staying single or stayed single instead of getting married, moved interstate or overseas instead of staying put, taken a risk instead of playing it safe.
That’s the beauty of hindsight. We can replay any situation, take out the parts we’d rather forget and put it back together how we think it should have happened, but it’s a pointless exercise. Finding others to blame for our misfortune or dwelling on regrets is about as useless as repeatedly hitting the replay button and expecting the outcome to be different each time. However important or insignificant have been our choices along the way, they have still been our choices. Or maybe we held back and didn’t choose what we wanted. Even then, the not choosing was a choice, and when it boils down to it, we will eventually regret more the things we did not do rather than the things we did.
‘What if’ can be filled with sadness for what might have been, but I love the idea of ‘what if’ being the initiation of something completely new. Thomas Edison himself said “I have not failed. I have found 10,000 ways that won't work.” Every time his experiments failed to produce the desired result, he had to stop, think again and approach the next step with ‘what if I tried this…’ and because of his perseverance more than a thousand inventions were attributed to him in his lifetime. Without responding to the possibility of a different outcome, no inventions, no progress would ever be made. No one would ever entertain the idea that things could be done any differently than they have always been. Scientists and engineers and architects and so many more innovators are the embodiment of ‘what if,’ stepping into the realm of the unknown to explore the possibility of what might be.
Every experience in life brings us to the present moment, for we are the sum of the parts, whether good or bad, that have made us who we are. Our whole lives are not predetermined though, and no one wants to drop off into the hereafter filled with regret, so I much prefer the idea of looking forward with a what might be attitude rather than looking back with a what might have been one. Even at this stage in my life, I wonder where that approach could take me if I truly believe it’s possible.
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