If YOU Could Go Back In Time In Your Life...

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danie

I am whatever you say I am.
Feb 26, 2008
9,760
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Kentucky
There's a really cool novel about this, Replay by Ken Grinwood.

I would go back and live my life over with a little more self-confidence. Then again, i have great kids now, a job i like, i don't want to change anything that made me miss that...
I am reading Replay now, and I'm about halfway through. I am really enjoying the concept and the author's voice.
 

thekidd12

Baseball is a good thing.Always was,always will be
Apr 8, 2016
1,791
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NC
At the very least, I hope this has positively informed your life in the present. Great post.
Thanks for the praise of post. The first time I have ever said those thoughts out loud.

I assume I am still in the depression stage of grief somewhat. Can't find many positives. Haven't reached acceptance quite yet I guess.

My family has always been farmers by trade. I myself went off to college and returned because...well not sure exactly why, either I didn't want to have a boss or I liked 14 hour workdays. Anyway spent almost 47 years of those work days with my father.

Left a big hole as I know losing a parent has for people since time began. Only problem is that somewhere in those 47 years he somehow became my best friend too. So I guess I feel like I lost twice as much in one afternoon.

Anyway I know it is not a history changing wish, like killing baby Hitler or telling Hindenburg passengers to take the bus , but those words are the ones I wish I would have said.

Sorry I turned you guys' forum into a shrink's couch.
 
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GNTLGNT

The idiot is IN
Jun 15, 2007
87,651
358,754
62
Cambridge, Ohio
Thanks for the praise of post. The first time I have ever said those thoughts out loud.

I assume I am still in the depression stage of grief somewhat. Can't find many positives. Haven't reached acceptance quite yet I guess.

My family has always been farmers by trade. I myself went off to college and returned because...well not sure exactly why, either I didn't want to have a boss or I liked 14 hour workdays. Anyway spent almost 47 years of those work days with my father.

Left a big hole as I know losing a parent has for people since time began. Only problem is that somewhere in those 47 years he somehow became my best friend too. So I guess I feel like I lost twice as much in one afternoon.

Anyway I know it is not a history changing wish, like killing baby Hitler or telling Hindenburg passengers to take the bus , but those words are the ones I wish I would have said.

Sorry I turned you guys' forum into a shrink's couch.
...it's ok, we have all used this forum as a couch at one time or another....you are among friends....
 

Pucker

We all have it coming, kid
May 9, 2010
2,906
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We've bandied this (and everything else) before, but if it's a case of going back to a specific point and changing a specific event, I would do so without reservation, "Butterfly Effect" be damned.

It's all well and good to fear dominoes falling, but even if I had to retain the knowledge of what I knew "would have been," there is no price I would not pay to give a host of people (and the host of people who love them) a chance to know what might be.

This is a no-brainer.
 

Steffen

Well-Known Member
Aug 9, 2015
2,233
12,800
There's an old saying that 'he who regrets nothing learns from everything'...this bugs me. I think regret serves a purpose; it is a type of grieving that hopefully leads to acceptance and avoidance of cyclic mistakes. So, yes, I'm one who'd go back in time. This isn't to say that I wouldn't commit a whole new set of mistakes (and, therefore, new regrets) but it would satisfy that human longing for atonement, a correcting of wrongs, a settling of scores.
Plus, it would be my duty to rid the world of M.C. Hammer parachute pants.

I like your thinking there Doc; well said.

Me, I would go back if only to spend more time on myself rather than all the years I sacrificed putting others before self with nothing to show for it.

Them parachute pants, though...;-D
 

Pucker

We all have it coming, kid
May 9, 2010
2,906
6,242
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Me, I would go back if only to spend more time on myself rather than all the years I sacrificed putting others before self with nothing to show for it.

Hmmmmm ....

Steffen ... you're kind of killing me here. It seems like you're saying two different things.

On one hand, it appears that you're about to break your arm patting yourself on the back for being such a "selfless" guy .... and then you turn around and project selfishness by wondering how come there wasn't any "reward" for that.

I'll admit to being pretty stupid myself (and there are at least a couple people on this forum who can readily verify that), but it seems to me like you don't want to go back and change anything ... you just want folks to look up and realize how totally awesome you are.

I'd dial that back, if it was me.
 

Steffen

Well-Known Member
Aug 9, 2015
2,233
12,800
Hmmmmm ....

Steffen ... you're kind of killing me here. It seems like you're saying two different things.

On one hand, it appears that you're about to break your arm patting yourself on the back for being such a "selfless" guy .... and then you turn around and project selfishness by wondering how come there wasn't any "reward" for that.

I'll admit to being pretty stupid myself (and there are at least a couple people on this forum who can readily verify that), but it seems to me like you don't want to go back and change anything ... you just want folks to look up and realize how totally awesome you are.

I'd dial that back, if it was me.

Yeah on the surface that does appear a bit sanctimonious. Didn't mean it that way.
 

BrokenolMarine

Well-Known Member
Dec 13, 2016
128
587
65
As I said in the original post, this has been a question I have used over the years to provoke long conversations in groups of friends, and the answers are often surprising.

The restriction of one jump, to one moment in time, to change a specific event, but still knowing everything you know now, complicates things. You correct a bad decision, but you have unfair knowledge about not just your family and friends' futures, but economy.. (invest in microsoft) ... wars to come, etc.

I think about each change I could go back and make...
... the pros and cons... and all the different moments in MY timeline I could choose.
It makes my head hurt.

When you propose the question over coffee or at a small party, there isn't time for them to get too deep. That comes later, after the friends go home. They often end up discussing the question again, among themselves, or the next time we run into one another. "You know that question? I've been thinking, and..."

Sounds like a King story.. but going back and changing your path?
The new path could be short and extremely painful, and remember. The other rule was no takebacks.

In the end, I decided to pass on the jump.
 

doowopgirl

very avid fan
Aug 7, 2009
6,946
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dublin ireland
This something I have thought about. Mabe I should have stayed in school. Maybe this or that. Maybe I should have stood up to someone. Maybe I should or should not have said something. But I don't think it would work that way. The things we do or don't make us into the people we are today. There is a Dean Koontz book called Lightening that is one of the few of his I really like. The basic idea is that destiny struggles to make things come out the way they are supposed to. Also, I have good life and the way things happened in my life made me able to appreciate the things I have today.
 

thekidd12

Baseball is a good thing.Always was,always will be
Apr 8, 2016
1,791
11,136
60
NC
Hmmmm...Good Question....I would go back and tell my mom to invest in Microsoft and Apple! :)
If you have to tell your MOM to do that then you are ineligible to participate.

You have not been around long enough to technically count as history.

OK that was mean spirited...sorry.

The "get off my lawn" side of me came out.
 

Doc Creed

Well-Known Member
Nov 18, 2015
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United States
I have to say that I wouldn't want to live the same moment, be it good or bad, over again. I think that's what makes our present moment so precious; before you can say 'now' the moment has passed. As we age time seems to accelerate (this is interesting all in itself) and we realize just how invaluable our remaining time really is.

This isn't a contradiction to my previous statement, I don't think. Despite the impossibility of time travel, I still say I'd change a critical moment in my past providing that I wouldn't have to repeat every experience that I've already had following it. Wow, that's a mindbender.

*note to self: don't come back to this thread. :)
 

Doc Creed

Well-Known Member
Nov 18, 2015
17,221
82,822
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United States
This something I have thought about. Mabe I should have stayed in school. Maybe this or that. Maybe I should have stood up to someone. Maybe I should or should not have said something. But I don't think it would work that way. The things we do or don't make us into the people we are today. There is a Dean Koontz book called Lightening that is one of the few of his I really like. The basic idea is that destiny struggles to make things come out the way they are supposed to. Also, I have good life and the way things happened in my life made me able to appreciate the things I have today.
Yes, exactly.
:encouragement::encouragement: