I believe one of the modes least likely to bring you happiness is “living in regret”.  There are people that will reflect back on nearly everything they do or have done and regret not undertaking the alternate choice at the time.  Some will say it is a form of Perfectionism gone wrong.  By gone wrong I mean, it started out as an adherence to high standards but with increased responsibilities and pressures in life, the inability to adhere to standards expected by the mind, have led to a dull mode of indecisiveness.  This indecisiveness means that when decisions are finally made, they were clouded by the emotions at the time, or motivated by fear and invariably regretted later or upon reflection when a different emotional component is in operation, or when the element of fear has been realised to be false.

Despite the different theories or reasons, we all know a person or people that would fit this description.

I read a saying by the late Dr Wayne Dyer that said:

“You can come to a beautiful temple every Sunday, and you can practice all kinds of Bible sayings, and you can label yourself with the most fantastic tags that you can come up with, but you won’t find your heart in a temple if you don’t have a temple in your heart.”

This quote refers to finding happiness within and by operating from a heart driven centre.

I believe sometimes that people living in regret, are possibly stuck in a head space.  Their search for happiness is completely outside of themselves, and defined more by their environmental circumstances.  On this note they will often compare themselves to others on external world defined indices of success and achievement and other attributes outside of themselves.  They might even buy or do many unnecessary things in the belief that it will bring them happiness.  So the search for happiness is redundant and leads to regret.

I have even found that with some people that fall into this category, “the ol’ rational emotive” approach to changing the way they feel by changing the way they think has Buckley’s chance  of making a change.  The consciousness holding the thought structure in place can be so strong that no matter what you say, it does not make a dent on the thought pattern.

I have found that for these people, you need to change the way they feel first, and possibly the thoughts might follow or match up to the more positive feeling of aliveness.

This is where I think, alternate therapies as they are sometimes called can be very beneficial.    Reiki, massage, crystal, flower essence, float tanks and so forth.  Anything that changes the way you feel, by shutting down your mind and bringing your focus to the body – I believe is a great place to start.

Of course, if you know people that fall into this category, so to speak, you will also know that this is the last thing they are likely to do because they are searching for happiness via the mind.  Even if a change was experienced, they would not attribute it to the therapy.

However, if it’s your wife or husband, or loved one that is stuck in this mode, why not buy them a course in anything designed to change the way they feel or “raise their vibrational energy” as it is sometimes described.

Photography by MDH and Fagun Mishra