Je ne regrette rien

January 24 2007

Falser words were never spoken. I regret a lot of things, the nitty gritty details of which I won’t go into now or ever… Hmm so what is the point of this? I wanted to make some observations on the necessity of guilt whether you’re Catholic or not. Well, tis the season to reflect and all that jazz.

So I was talking to my flatmate the other night, and she’s Italian, I was asking her if she believed in God, etc, and what her take on Catholicism was. She told me she didn’t believe in the things the Catholic church preached but she does believe there is a higher being. I too believe this, but that is about the long and short of the extent of my beliefs falling in line with organized religion. Anyhoodle she was saying something about how she was made to feel guilty for everything because it is according to her church; a sin. Wow would I have a lot to atone for! I mean thinking about it I can appreciate the necessity of a mechanism of contrition for people; kind of a way to enforce morality on people; collectively as members of society and individually too, etc. But to feel guilty for everything equates to feeling guilty for existing and that I cannot fathom.

Well you can wish you were never born for reasons all of your own but that’s a different kettle of fish. Back on to the subject at hand… guilt and regrets. Hmm… a better cocktail I cannot imagine. I believe I could talk about this until the cows came home. I’ll approach this in alphabetical order.

Guilt = "In psychology and ordinary language, guilt is an affective state in which one experiences conflict at having done something one believes one should not have done (or, conversely, not having done something one believes one should have done). It gives rise to a feeling that does not go away easily, driven by conscience." (wikipedia definition). Well punch me in the face and call me Norman! That pretty much sums it up doesn’t it? Guilt is all about agonizing on decisions one has already made. Which is from an objective view a colossal waste of time, I mean when you feel guilty what do you learn? Other than how crap you can feel about spilt milk and the decision to do better? It’s a fruitless exercise. No fruit for the guilty.

Regret = "is an intelligent (and/or emotional) dislike for personal past acts and behaviours." (wikipedia definition) - Well as long as it as an intelligent dislike I'm sure there be lots of company on the Regret train, last stop before Depressionville. *ugh*

Dictionary.com also defines it as:
"a feeling of sorrow or remorse for a fault, act, loss, disappointment, etc. "

And then we got Sydney J Harris who purports, yes that’s correct I just said purport.

"Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable."

I really wanted to get into this, you know really delve deep into the meaning of these debilitating emotions and then I remembered TOK (Theory of Knowledge) and how much I grew to hate any type of philosphical in-depth pandering, and also I got over my baggage that had prompted me to start this blog (like in December 2006). So I thought, in the end the age old adage of not bothering to say anything at all because someone smarter and more eloquent already did, applies to this situation. Therefore... to ALL OF THAT I say stick it, it's a NEW YEAR and I'm still alive and kicking so out with the old and in with new! I can't wait to see what 2007 has in store for me, I'm sure it'll be a real humdinger... isn't it always!?