Ep 184: Turning Regret into Career and Life Growth: A Five-Step Process for Moving Forward

It's about having the clarity , self-confidence and unstoppable belief to go after and get everything you want . If you'll come with me , I'll show you how Well . Hello friends . I hope you had an amazing week . Today I want to talk about regret . That is a big word .

It's a little word , but it's a big word in terms of impact on our life , and I think it's something that all of us can get caught up in in different ways , so it can definitely impact us in any part of our career .

So if you're an entrepreneur or if you're on the corporate track either one there are endless decisions that we make as we go on that journey that can lead to regret , and I think the same is true in our personal life .

There are so many big life choices available to us at different times in our life , whether to have children or not , what partner or partners we choose during our life , when to get in and out of a relationship , what large purchase decisions to make , like there's so many things in our life that require us to make a decision , sometimes with a great , complete

picture and all the data points you'd want to have to consider , and sometimes not right .

We don't always have the information that we might want to have , and I think it's important to have a way to think about and manage through regret in terms of just understanding it and how to work your way through it mentally , and do that in a way that doesn't expand what ?

Probably because to me , when we're in a point of regret , it means that something has happened . We've point of regret . It means that something has happened . We've made a choice in some fashion , either formally or informally .

Either we've actively made a choice or we've not made a choice and that's led to an outcome that is in some way unwelcome or incomplete or not 100% aligned with what we might've wanted it to be right . So there we are , in that unwelcome outcome and now we're wondering what if ? What if I hadn't made that choice ? Or what if I'd made a different choice ?

Right , and it's really easy to look at that path . You didn't take that person , you didn't choose that job , you said no to or said yes to and regret it and just stay fixated on what if I'd taken that path and not this one ? Because this path really sucks .

It's easy to really get stuck there and the problem with that is that when we get stuck in regret it can be a very self-destructive path and if we're not careful , if we don't kind of manage our way through that in a productive way , it can turn into something that becomes this bigger narrative about all the things that are wrong with you , you know , in terms

of how you make decisions , or bad luck follows you around like a dark cloud , or whatever you make decisions , or bad luck follows you around like a dark cloud or whatever .

This is coming up for me today because I've had a private coaching client and I want to share a little bit about her story today only to illustrate how regret if you don't productively manage through it , the impact that romancing the regret can have on your life , and I think too , how it can start to erode what , for my client , has always been before this

reasonably strong level of self-belief or a strong self-concept that's starting to erode because she's stuck in this really vicious cycle of regret . So let's go ahead and dive into the story of my client . She's said it's fine for me to share her story , although I am going to keep it really general .

Just try to use it to illustrate some of the things that can happen to us when we make decisions and the aftermath is something that we wish it wasn't . So Michaela actually took a job about 15 months before she started working with me . She had accepted a job at the end of 2020 .

So , in the middle of the pandemic , with a company like she's New York based , new York City , and this company is in the Midwest I'm not going to say where , but it's a city that for Michaela . I'm not dissing the Midwest because I'm actually from the Midwest , but Michaela was born on the East coast , her family's there .

She was not interested in moving to the Midwest or to this particular smaller Midwest city in particular . She was , however , very interested in the opportunity and they reached out to her cold a recruiter from her LinkedIn profile and were very interested in her skillset .

She's highly specialized and she's in a very high growth field and has had some really interesting jobs .

She's kind of early mid-career , I would say she's like late thirties , and she's got her master's degree and she's starting to build a great reputation for herself and she's got a great mix of big company stuff and startups and you know she's just got a lot to offer .

And so these people reached out to her and she was talking to them about the opportunity and it was a really weird time . The whole pandemic was weird , but you know , for hiring it was very odd because it's like before that and I know there's some notable exceptions , but for the most part before the pandemic .

Here's kind of how it worked with like interviews usually for bigger jobs , is that the recruiter would reach out . You'd start with a phone screen with the recruiter .

If they thought you had sort of the profile that was of interest , then they would sort of summarize your profile and send it to the hiring manager and then the hiring manager would take all of these people that had been phone screened and they would select a short list , right , and then from there usually what happened is you would do a I'm generalizing here

because there were some variances , but for the most part you would then do a couple of phone screens . Very few companies before the pandemic really did a lot of video interviewing . Some were starting to , but for the most part it was phone screens and then you flew right .

You would fly there two or three times , which is always hard on the schedule when you're currently employed .

But none of that happened for Michaela in this job or anyone else , probably in the middle of the pandemic , because you couldn't travel , you couldn't get on a plane , you couldn't stay in a hotel there's all the quarantine stuff , if you remember , like it was just a hot mess .

And so what happened was that she had started with the phone screen but then it was all video , right , and when you're on video it's just different and you don't have any opportunity to travel , you don't get a sense of place , so you don't really know what the environment of the company is . You don't get the vibe .

There's always an energy to a culture , so when you're there you get a sense of what it would be like to work there every day . You don't really know until you start with a company , but when you are in that energy I think you can kind of get a sense of it .

And she didn't have that Right and she didn't get to meet the people face to face , so the whole person and the body language , and spending , you know , a couple of hours with , with the hiring manager or whatever and maybe a couple of people on the team . Very different than a , you know , 30 or 60 minute video interview , which can be , I don't know .

It can be good , but it can be really awkward and one dimensional . I think can be , and it certainly doesn't isn't enough to give you a sense of whether or not you know it's a place you're interested in . And then I think to the last pieces .

If you're , if you've never been to a city before , I think it's important to know if that's a city you want to be in , right , and it's like on paper we had zero interest to her , but you never know , like and like .

For me I'll just say like there was something or much earlier on in my career and it was a opportunity that was Philadelphia based and I'd never been to Philadelphia . It didn't seem like a place I wanted to be .

But what was interesting was that was what I considered to be my first really big senior level break in terms of breaking into the executive ranks , and it's like I went there to interview for that company in person . I fell in love with that city and to this day I've lived in 10 or 14 cities .

I think now that is absolutely at the top of the list , very cool place in my opinion . And I would have never pointed at Philadelphia and said I must live there , but I thought it was a beautiful city and the surrounding countryside is just breathtaking . I thought . So that's my point is , you know , she didn't have that .

She's never been to this place and she didn't get the chance to go because it was a pandemic .

So , anyway , she worked her way through the interview process and they offered her an amazing title , amazing huge salary jump , and she thought the company had a little bit of a reputation , a good reputation , a little buzz , a little industry buzz , and she was thinking this would be a really cool next step for me .

And the icing on the cake is they told her , you know , it's the middle of the pandemic , we're not having people work hybrid , we're all remote . We're going to stay that way for the foreseeable future , maybe forever .

Right , so you can work from where you are and when things calm down we'll probably have you travel in , but you know , that's kind of where it is Well , so she started , she quit her job , a job that she enjoyed but was kind of ready for a change . And she started , but was kind of ready for a change and she started .

So the companies , for her , like the job's been okay . She doesn't love it for a variety of reasons Doesn't love the culture . It's very territorial in her opinion , very political . She doesn't really love her management team . They're , in her words , sort of part of the problem .

For her she just likes a certain kind of vibe and culture and this company does not have that and she thinks that if she had been able to interview in person she would have sensed that she would have picked up on that . And now that things are sort of back to normal , at least the pandemic thing is kind of we're past that and people are traveling again .

They have asked her to travel in . So she's made several trips there and she knows with absolute certainty this is not a place she wants to live . It probably wouldn't have been anyway because for her she's very close to her family and her family all lives in the Northeast . For her she's very close to her family and her family all lives in the Northeast .

So she was not looking to relocate out of the area but she definitely is not open to do it for this particular city . She's not just not a place she wants to live . So she's got all of this stuff right . And so , you know , six months ago , around the time she reached out to me , they told her that she was around .

The time she reached out to me , they told her that she was everyone who was remote was going to have to come back to the office , and at least three days a week , and it has to be in person every person , no exception . And in exchange for that , they're offering to pay a relocation and they're giving her until the end of the year , right ?

So now we're coming up on , we're six months away from the end of the year and she's really feeling the pressure and not wanting to do it and rather than saying , okay , so I don't want to move . So now , what am I going to do next ? Looking for her next opportunity . She's really stuck and beating herself up for the decision that she made .

I should have known better . I should have not done this without being able to travel in . I should have never made this kind of a decision , and for her it started out there . You know I should have done this . I shouldn't have done that .

You know all this stuff and it has now enlarged to and , by the way , I always make bad decisions , like look at my romantic life , it's a disaster . It's like and I hate the condo that I bought two years ago Like she's now . It's like her whole life is just one big steaming pile of poo in her opinion , which , of course , is not true .

But it's very easy to do that to ourself , right , when we ruminate endlessly on a big life choice that we made that did not turn out well . That constant rumination is going to expand and we're going to start building these narratives around how we make decisions that it's just not going to serve you . So I don't know if any of that sounds familiar .

I can tell you there have been times in my life earlier on that I have definitely been the queen of regret , right ? I had a divorce , you know , earlier on , and you know and I did a number on myself for that one and there've been different choices that I've made career-wise that I thought what in the world were you thinking ?

And it doesn't serve you to look at regret in what I would call a default kind of way . I do think , though , so I want to start with what's good about regret . I do think it's important to pay attention to how we feel and what is going on , specifically when we've just made a choice and we have an outcome that we did not want .

That , I think , is important to know , it's important to see it and to not deny it . But I think it's kind of I would say it's important to do that with boundaries and structure . I would say it's important to do that with boundaries and structure

. What's not helpful is what most of us do , which is over-dramatize it , beat ourselves up endlessly for it and expand it to encompass every choice we've ever made right .

And when we do that , it's really easy , a really it's a hop skip and a jump away from starting to look at your life situation , which it's so easy to tell yourself after having a big regret . It really it's easy to look at your own life and say see just the imperfection of it . Right , and , by the way , everyone's life is imperfect .

But it's easy to look at it and through that lens , and say my life really sucks and it's my fault and it's because I make really bad decisions and I have to pull my head out of my you know what effective immediately .

You know it's really easy to be kind of mean to yourself and then look at from the outside someone else's life and say , see , look at them , like everything there is perfect , they make all these good decisions and my decisions suck right .

That comparison thing can be very destructive when it's done through that lens , because the truth of the matter is that no one's life is perfect and everything that we do is a 50-50 .

I just I think you know it's easy to forget that , it's easy to say I just want my life to be happy , and I think the truth of the matter is that life is just always going to be a mix of the things that we want and the things that we don't want .

And I think the important thing to remember is that any choice that you make has a 50-50 shot of resembling the outcome that you wanted . It might also not , and it doesn't mean that it was a bad decision .

It means that maybe you didn't have all the information you needed or maybe something about the factors around that decision changed either during or after you made the decision . Like we cannot know , we don't have a crystal ball and we're not in control of everything that happens with every decision that we make .

All we can do is try to gather all the information , be clear about what we want and try to make the decisions that are most aligned with that , based on the information that we have .

And if it doesn't work out , the answer is not to beat yourself up or to say that everything in your life sucks or that you always make this bad decisions , or whatever you're telling yourself . The answer is to try to go through a very structured process of evaluation . I do think that's helpful and I think it's a very effective way to manage through regret .

So I want to walk you through the five steps that I'm helping Michaela with right now . We're about halfway through it . I think it's going to take her another several weeks to kind of get to a place where she can kind of set down her bag of regret and start looking forward to her future .

So let me share those five steps with you , because I do think they're really important and if there's something I think they'll be very helpful to you , if there's something that you're working through in your life that you regret . So the first thing to do is you do need to accept reality , and I think it is important to pay attention .

If regret is coming up for you , it is a very though I will say it's a very uncomfortable emotion and if we don't do an effective processing through that , like either with a coach or by coaching yourself , this can really do a number on you .

Because when I say accept reality , it does require looking at the outcome of the decision and the things that you're thinking about , the situation that you're in and the reality of the situation that you're in and the emotions that that can bring up , because you need to acknowledge the full reality of the thing that you regret , and that means what is it about it

, what's going on and what about it is not aligned with what you want and , depending on what that situation is , that can be a very painful thing to look at , because you're already in it and a lot of us , instead of looking , we may just hate the situation that we're in and we may be doing things to buffer ourselves , to make ourselves feel better , like

some of us overeat , some of us over drink , some of us over Facebook , over Netflix , like there's a bunch of consumption behaviors we do to numb ourselves .

And I think it's really easy to do that when you're feeling something related to regret , because it's probably there's probably something very painful or uncomfortable about the outcome , and that can be really hard to look at .

But it's important to not only look at it , but you do need to , I would say , in an appropriate way acknowledge your role in what the outcome is .

You've got to open up to that because , like in Michaela's situation , one of the things we're working on is , I said , well , one of the things for you to know now and not to beat yourself up for , but to know is that for you , you have a very specific goal when it comes to where you live , and there are reasons for that .

And other people don't have that same thing . Other people are in families who the families are spread out all over in some cases , the world , right . So for them , where they live doesn't really matter . For you , michaela , it does matter , right . So it's like you know .

One of the learnings from this is don't even talk to a company that's not going to either allow you to work remotely and get that in writing permanently , or only talk to companies that are based up there in the , in the Northeast , where you are Right . So that's a really important learning .

So that was something she hadn't really thought about before and we were at a really weird time . But you know , companies are reversing their decisions and that's what they're doing to everyone , not just Michaela , so you know . So that was a good , important lesson .

I think the other one for her was that the vibe of the place is really important and for her , you know , you just can't know that on a video interview right , and for some people they can adapt to a wide variety of cultures . She has something very specific in mind and for her , they can adapt to a wide variety of cultures .

She has something very specific in mind and for her , she didn't really acknowledge that or even know that until she found herself in this particular situation . While the company has a lot of buzz to it , it's a more traditional culture with more traditional hierarchies and power structures and a slower pace .

And she even though she couldn't have she says , couldn't have articulated that before she really is drawn to companies that are more she calls them fluid , but more being built , I would say earlier growth stage , more entrepreneurial , didn't know that .

So for her , like what I'm trying to help her see , is that , yeah , it's a shame that this situation did not turn out the way you wanted , but you've learned some valuable things that now you take forward with you .

Right , those things may change in the future , but for right now , you know you're not interested in a more traditionally structured company , something that has more entrenched traditional culture to it . You want something probably more startup-y or more you know , maybe in a growth division of an existing , a bigger company or something like that .

Like , that's important to know . And the other thing that's important to know is under no circumstances are you willing to move , right ? So for her , I'm trying to let her see that it's okay to have regret . You've learned some valuable things . Now , what are we going to do now ? Right ?

So that's what I mean by that and you need to kind of own , I think , your part in it , and I think not in a bad way .

So for her , she just didn't know those things before she experienced it . She needed the lesson . She just didn't know those things before she experienced it . She needed the lesson , right , and she was going to learn the lesson on both those things probably at one point or another . She's learned it right now .

Right , she doesn't want to move and she likes more entrepreneurial culture , and it's just not something that she really defined , because those tended to be the opportunities before that that were coming her way . Now that she finds herself in something more traditional , she's like this is just not for me , right .

So you know , look at the regret and understand what to take from it , but don't make it about you Right , and kind of know sort of what you're feeling too . I think that is an important part of seeing it . That's an important part of like accepting reality is understanding how you're feeling right now . Are you feeling guilty for making the decision ?

Are you feeling sad ? Are you feeling shame ? Are you feeling defeat ? Like what are you ? What are you feeling ? Right ? And I think it's important to see it and own those emotions rather than try to avoid them and practice some other behaviors that might not serve you , like over drinking , over eating , over spending , over over whatevering .

It's not going to serve you , right . So own the emotions that you feel as part of the regret , and that's the only way to really process through them . So you've got to accept it . That's number one . Number two is that when you're doing that , you need to do that from a place of having compassion for yourself .

So she really weaponized her feelings of regret against herself . Right , she was blaming herself , she was shitting herself . I should have done this , I shouldn't have done that . I should know better , I should have listened to my friends . You know , should have , could have , would have , and it's not going to lead you any place .

Good , you know , it's never going to lead . I guess that that punishing energy is never going to lead you anywhere that you want to go in the future . It's just going to keep you sort of stuck . It shuts down the learning centers in the brain and it leads to anxiety and shame and all of that and it can really really get you stuck .

So that's number two is be kind to yourself . You know , don't feel guilty about it . Like , don't get into any thing about blaming yourself . You've made a decision . It didn't turn out the way you want it , okay , you know , and just sort of accept it , like we said in number one , and start to think about how are you going to move forward from here .

So number three is to be mindful , and that means avoid the thought traps that can come when you're feeling regret , and this is I was alluding to it earlier but things like catastrophizing the shooting , like I should have done this , I shouldn't have done that , I should have known better , I should have you know .

That's like fortune telling behavior and it's like you can only know what you know . It can only make decisions from that place . That's what she did and it didn't turn out the way she wanted .

I kind of think , though , like and this is what I've told her she's not here yet , but I really believe that for her this was a very important lesson at early mid-career that can inform the rest of her career . She knows she has more knowledge now about what she wants and what she doesn't want .

That's valuable information to know at the stage of career that she's had . So I don't really know that it was a bad thing . It moved her ahead in title . It moved her ahead in income . She's gotten some decent experience here . Very easy to explain to her employer the narrative hey , I didn't want to move here . I thought it was a remote position .

It wasn't , so I'm looking for something back in New York . Very , very easy narrative to explain . No self-blaming or nasty thinking is necessary here and it's like some of the other thought traps that you can get into . Beyond the fortune telling I should have done this or I shouldn't have done that are things like all or nothing thinking .

Everything's either all good or all bad . That's not necessarily true . Catastrophizing oh , because I've made this bad decision , every other decision I make now is going to turn out horrible . And then I think , dismissing too and making everything about the decision bad . It's like I don't know . Is that true ? That's what I told her . I said I don't know .

That that's true . It's not like you took a pay cut or a title downstep . This moved you ahead in every way . You just don't want to move there and you don't really love the vibe of the culture . That's not the end of the world . That's just good things to know . And it's just now time to look forward , right .

But it's easy when you're in that negative regret thought loop to really convince yourself that everything about the situation is bad , everything about all your future decisions is going to be bad . And then the fortune telling is my personal favorite Like , oh , you know , my crystal ball wasn't working that day . It's like , well , you don't really have one .

There are no guarantees in life . All you can do is make decisions with the knowledge that you have at the time and hope for the best outcome . And if you don't get it now , it's time for another decision , right ? Learn the lessons from this one and move forward . It's , honestly , that simple .

So step number three is to really be mindful of thought traps , and then number four is own it and be prepared to do what you need to do .

Next , I like to tell my clients I do think the two most empowering and exciting words that we can say to ourself is now what and this is where Michaela is at she's spent all the time she needs to spend , you know , looking at it and feeling the emotions of it , and we've worked on undoing all of the negative narratives she was telling herself about what it

all means , about her and her decision-making ability , and now it's time for her to decide which direction she wants to head . And , because of the regret that she feels , there's certain things that she knows Now . She knows she needs to center her job search efforts on either 100% fully remote jobs anywhere or jobs that are based in her regional area period .

That's what she needs to do , and she also knows that she probably wants to be with a more early stage company or a more early stage business unit within an established company . She does not want or , at this stage of her career , enjoy being a part of a culture that is more traditional and , I would say , traditionally based .

She wants something more entrepreneurial , more fluid . For her , it's just something that is very important to her , something she really didn't know until she encountered the situation , because before that she'd always been in more entrepreneurial environments .

So to really own it and start doing what needs to be done and that means you're going to have to start shifting out of regret into possibility and shifting from where you are right now into your future and making some decisions about areas you want to pursue and things that you want to go do .

I think it's exciting , but it can feel very daunting if you're still holding on to regret , and one of the good ways to get out of it is to really start taking action towards your future . So that's number four , and then number five is learning the lessons .

So I think I already hit on this a little bit , but you know , regret is a valuable tool and it can teach us things about the things we want and the things we don't want , and the things that are important to us that we might not have ever really known or put a thought to .

It may have just been in there as more of like a hidden value , and it's important to really mine the situation , that you're in that situation you regret . Mine it for all of the lessons , because there are lots of little nuggets in there that are important for you to pay attention to and to use as part of the filter you use on future decisions

. So I think that too leads us to , I think , for me , what the final lesson and word on regret is , and that is beyond just knowing that . You know , everything in life isn't through rose colored glasses . You know it's like some things happen and we just didn't want them to happen .

Some things really suck , you know , and those are periods of our life where , when we exit that stage , usually we're really relieved to no longer be in that place . But I do think that place is actually where we have the most personal knowledge . We gain the most knowledge of ourselves and what we really really want , like what's really aligned with us .

I think it's easier to come to know yourself through regret and you know things unwelcome outcomes than it is during the upside .

The upside's great too , but for a different set of reasons , I think self-knowledge comes through the downsides , and I also think it's just another way to look at regret is to say , hey , I need to stop telling myself that I make bad decisions and that every other decision I've ever made or ever will make is bad , and instead say I'm going to take from this

some really important lessons . What did I learn from this ? That I need to know that I factor into every other decision that I make , going forward , and instead of looking at regret as like you're a lost cause or your life is hopelessly off track and there's nothing you can do to ever get it back .

And that's really where , like Michaela was heading down , instead to tell her hey , listen , you are only like 38 years old and look at some of the most valuable lessons you've learned from this . Just this one particular experience . I mean , I know that it's not didn't turn out the way you want it , but is it really the end of the world ?

Or is it really just a great lesson in learning more about what Michaela wants , making sure that the things that you do going forward , making sure that the things that you do going forward make sure that that filter gets put on it ? That filter may change Like as she moves forward in her career .

She may not always want that entrepreneurial thing , or she may be more open to relocation , but that's not where she's at right now , and so knowing that is really really important , and it's something that before this she just didn't know . So she's starting to get there .

She's not punishing herself with her thoughts and her words as much as she was , and she's starting to look at the situation in a way that's more curious than self-blaming . So that's all I wanted to say today about regret .

I think it's uh , the important thing to know about it is that none of our for any human our life just doesn't always go the way we planned , and no matter how careful you are , how diligent you are about the decisions you make , there's no guarantee that the thing that you just decided is going to turn out the way you wanted .

Whether you have a marriage , whether you have a child , whether you have a career decision they made , whether you start a business , a friendship , you just don't know what the future holds , and all you can do is make the best decision available to you at the time and and know that if it doesn't work out exactly the way that you want , there's something to be

learned from it , and then you always have the ability to look towards your future with that new realization , the new learnings that you just had , and say , with all of this in mind now , what it's just so empowering . I'll leave you with this thought .

It's another way to look at regret is that it does kind of suck , feeling that deep sense of disappointment and anger and sadness and blame and all the stuff that we do to ourselves with regret . The truth of the matter is that it's the up and down of life that makes it worth living .

So really , usually , right on the other side of regret is some form of an upside , is some form of an upside , a new adventure , a new opportunity and a new possibility .

So that's the probably the upside of regret , beyond just the lessons , is you've got something new and exciting as a next step right in front of you and you have the power to make a great decision and start to move forward . So that's all I wanted to share today .

I hope you found the episode helpful and if you're in the middle of something where you're feeling that regret , I hope you take those five steps in mind . And , of course , if there's anything that I can ever do to help , please reach out to me at the purposefulcareercom forward slash contact us .

You can send me a thought or a question and you can always find me on Instagram at the purposeful career . I hope you follow me there and until next time , make it a great week . My friends , do you have a life coach ? If not , I'd be so honored to be your coach . I've created a virtual coaching program and monthly membership called Next Level .

Inside , we take the material you hear on this podcast , study it and then apply it . Join me at thepurposefulcareercom backslash next level . Don't forget the thepurposefulcareercom backslash next level . Join me and together we'll make your career in life everything you dream of . We'll see you there .