Once, I asked my son:
Me:
“Do you remember when you were in elementary school in Ajax, Canada?
You were bullied by an older kid who kicked your ball far away at the end of recess.
You ran after it, struggled to bring it back, and fell on the ground crying.”
Son:
“Yeah, I remember.”
Me:
“If you could go back to that moment—if you were strong enough to help yourself—what would you do?”
Son:
“I wouldn’t do anything. That’s who I was, and that’s what made me who I am now.
So I wouldn’t change it.”
I paused for a moment and asked quietly,
“Are you happy with who you are?”
He smiled and said,
“Are you NOT?”
Reflection
That conversation stayed with me.
How easily we forget that the person we are today is built on every version of who we once were — the shy one, the angry one, the lost one, the hurt one.
Yet we keep looking back, editing our past in our minds like it was a mistake to be corrected.
We replay scenes, rewrite words, imagine braver choices, kinder responses, cleaner endings.
But what life do we expect to build out of regret?
A life where we endlessly negotiate with ghosts,
or one where we finally accept the imperfect, beautiful architecture of our becoming?
Maybe wisdom isn’t about wishing to redo the past,
but learning to bow to it,
to thank it for what it gave,
and to walk on.
Because who you were was never the problem.
Only your refusal to make peace with it.
