Do not blame your past self. You could not have known. If you could, you would be living the perfect life all the time. No one lives the perfect life. In any single moment we are driven and influenced by our intuition, feelings, reason, thoughts, knowledge, self-awareness, sense of identity, physiological states, neurological wiring, memories, habits, ideas, associations, as well as our external environment and circusmtances.. to name but a few! If you had complete awareness and control over all of this (which you simply can’t), in addition to the ability to predict how your current actions would determine your future, only then could you have acted differently. This is why rumination and regret are ultimately pointless. The act of looking back onto an impossible reality will not change anything, except making you more unhappy in the present moment.

You are who you are. You’ve done what you’ve done. Let it go! Do not allow a second more of your life to be squandered by imagining that things could have been different. Every second of our lives is orchestrated in ways that are beyond our human comprehension. So many connection and contingencies have made it what it is, and brought you into being on this speculator earth in this vast universe. The most you can do, and the only thing you have true control over, is to look after the thoughts inside your head, and how best to use them in the moment you are currently in. Choose your focus. Shine your attention like a spotlight on the things you want to illuminate. Be hopeful for your future. No matter what your past is, and how dark or difficult is may have been, you are not the sum of your past actions or experiences. Let them inform you, but do not let them control you. You are wonderful and full of possibilities. Go forth and find them.