This is life. Life hurts.

[Adrian-kun]

To quote the hard-boiled Max Payne: 'There are no choices. Nothing but a straight line. The illusion comes afterwards, when you ask 'Why me?' and 'What if?'. When you look back and see the branches, like a pruned bonsai tree, or forked lightning. If you had done something differently, it wouldn't be you. It would be someone else looking back, asking a different set of questions.'

There was a period in my life when I was constantly asking myself: 'what if I had done this or said that?' I would even ask: 'why did I say this, why did I do this?'. Now I realise this is who I am. Everything I ever did or said is part of who I am. Even when I contradict myself or do something that is out of character, it is still me. It is just a different facet of me.
What about you guys? Do you take the time to analyse your actions or do you simply go with the flow taking the good with the bad?

[perrandy]

auto-exam and regret are part of my daily routine. but i know that if many things woulda have happened again i woulda make the same stupid mistakes again.because like the OP said those mistakes whether small or great
are part of who i am.so, there is nothing that i can do about them.the only thing that i try is to ask for forgiveness when/if i can and to forget.the best things tho is to learn from ones mistakes and never do it again whatever that entails.

all these ill-fated emotions are just part of life and we must learn to live and deal with it.

[Adrian-kun]

Excellent song perrandy

[Chaosblade]

Take it in stride, what's going to happen is going to happen. You can't change the future, just like you can't change the past.

That ability to think "what if" and imagine alternative scenarios is, for lack of a more positive yet simple way to put it, a miraculous coincidence.

[CelestialBlade]

Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it...and you've only got one shot. I've learned not to dwell on the past or look too far into the future, so I try to focus on the present. The only universal constant is change, so, I try and roll with it and do what I have to do to keep moving forward. Life goes on and so shall I.

[Sgt Phantomizer]

I don't really dwell on the possibilities that could have been nor what can be, i try to take life one day at a time, though there are exceptions to this sometimes. However, i do believe the future can be changed.

[Ryos]

If you dwell too long on what might have been, you won't be able to try to change the course of your life. Time is really the one thing you can't get back so analyzing what might have been is kind of a futile exercise. All you can do is build on what has transpired and hope for better if the present is not what you longed for years ago. There was a situation of a dream job that popped up that I had hoped to get and might have had I acquired the education that would have completed about the time that job vacancy appeared but that chance has come and gone and short of a time machine, there's no way to change that.

[Redhorse]

The way I feel can also be expressed with quotes:

"for a long time it seemed to me that life was about to begin - real life. but there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid. at last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life. this perspective has helped me to see there is no way to happiness. happiness is the way. so treasure every moment you have and remember that time waits for no one."

"finish each day and be done with it. you have done what you could. some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. tomorrow is a new day. you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense."

[Spacetortoise]

Life's too short for regret, you could drop dead at any second. Would you want your last moments on Earth to be wasted on regret?

[Ivy]

I can never stop analyzing my actions, no matter how much I try to pretend otherwise or desperately wish otherwise as my brain seems incapable of doing such and they call this severe anxiety and I have learned to go with the flow and by go with the flow I mean try to cope with heavy to light prescription and otc drug usage and abuse but it's not going very well as I'm sure is shocking to know and this is the part where I try to make a kind an helpful general statement to answer the question 8))))))))))