Sometimes I look back over my life and see all the mistakes I’ve made.  Some days my path looks like one wrong turn after another.  I review my life so far and I regret doing this, not doing that.  It’s a trap.  You’d think I’d recognize that by now.  Still, sometimes I fall into it like I’ve never seen it there before, never fallen down into that deep, black hole in the ground.

I suppose everyone looks back over their life with some measure of regret, wishing they could change something they did or something they didn’t do.  It is probably part of human nature.  It can be useful but only if you manage to extract the lessons from your past and move on, instead of just replay the mistakes in your mind over and over again.

When a regretful mood strikes me, I focus on this thought: God knows what He is doing and He has my best interests at heart.  That cuts through my mood and reminds me that God has put me here – in this place, on this path – for a reason.  It was not a mistake.  I didn’t mess up God’s plan.  (I doubt I could mess up God’s plan even if I tried.)

Just because some days I don’t know why I’m here doesn’t mean God doesn’t have a reason.  Just because some days I feel like I have done it all wrong doesn’t mean all is not exactly as God planned.  I wish I could always see what God has in mind for me, why He has put me on a certain path.  But I can’t.  That’s where faith comes in.

I believe that God really does know what He is doing.  So, when regret strikes, I hold fast to that article of faith and use it to pull myself out of the hole.