How to Clear Regrets After Someone Dies

Focus on this moment. Regret is a feeling based in the past. It’s difficult to live your life in the past when it’s actually happening in the present. Focusing on the moment means not being stuck on past experiences, thoughts, or thinking patterns. To help you tune in more to the present, bring your thoughts and awareness to now. Sit quietly and focus your mind on what’s happening right now.

• With practice, you can train yourself to focus on something more productive than feelings of regret.
• Practice attending to your breathing. Focus on your breath, noticing your inhales and exhales.

Tune into your senses. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by negative feelings associated with regret and can’t seem to get out of the cycle, turn to your senses. Chances are, if you’re caught up in regret, you’re not living presently. Focus on one sense at a time. For instance, start with sight and look around to observe what you notice. Really look with your eyes: notice colors, textures, movements, and contrasts of light and dark. Then tune into your hearing: listen to any noises occurring around you, from the hum of the air conditioner or footsteps across the hall. Slowly engage each sense one by one and bring yourself back to the moment.^[5]

• By focusing on your senses, you’re allowing yourself to bring yourself back to the moment and distance yourself from regret.

Practice self-compassion. Learn to stop applying judgments and evaluations to yourself and to all of your actions. Don’t put yourself in the category of “good” or “bad” and instead, learn to accept yourself as you are. Accept that you are learning and growing every day, and each day is a step closer toward being a kinder, better version of yourself. Practice self-compassion by experiencing kindness, mindfulness, and connectivity with others. ^[6]

• Practice caring for and about yourself. Treat yourself like you would treat a best friend. Care about your own thoughts, feelings, actions, and reactions. When you feel like you’re not good enough, ask yourself, “What would I say to a friend feeling this way?”

Apologize to anyone else involved. If your regret centers around someone who is deceased yet involves people who are living, sort out any unsaid apologies.^[7] If you can take action on something, do it, even if you feel embarrassed or ashamed. It’s best to say what needs to be said than to live in regret.

• For example, if someone in your family died and there were problems with other members of the family, sort any issues that can be sorted.

Use regret beneficially. While regret may seem to be fully negative, there can be positive aspects to feeling regret. Regret can be functional, such as encouraging an addict to seek recovery. Regret can help you take another look at your choices and reconsider how you want to live moving forward. It can encourage you to look at your actions and see how they lead to negative consequences. ^[8] Then, you’re left with a choice: do you want to continue living in this way or would you like to make a change?

• Regret may lead you to think about how you treat people in your life. For example, if someone you love died, you may regret not visiting enough or making time for this person. This can lead to a different approach to relationships where you begin to prioritize people in your life in a way that you never have before.

Reframe the situation more positively. Recognize that life exists as a journey, with many intersecting paths along the way. Instead of getting down on yourself or feeling like you’ve made mistakes, acknowledge that you’ve had opportunities to learn and grow. Perhaps the growth didn’t happen in the past, but recognize that it is happening now.^[9]

• If you regret not spending enough time with someone before he or she died, acknowledge the time you did spend together. Reflect on the positive aspects of the relationship, both what you cherish and what the other person cherished.