“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did. Throw off the bow lines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Imagine. Discover who you really are and what is most important in your life.” Mark Twain
Now if it only it was Spring.
Twain was wrong. I am very disappointed by some of the things I did do, and hardly give a thought to the trillion things I didn’t do.
For example, it doesn’t bother me at all that I never learned Urdu, never married by first cousin, and never learned how to spell Connecticut.
On the other hand I am intensely disappointed that I did break my gooseneck while leading a race, did break my trailer spring heading to a regatta, and did capsize so many times at last year’s Masters Worlds.
The only way to avoid disappointment is to stay at home with a glass of Scotch and read Moby Dick.
A land lubber might regret being on the water even when things go well but a sailor yearns for the water, the waves, and even the disappointment. “Land was created to provide a place for boats to visit.”
– Brooks Atkinson
I too await spring and will undoubtedly be on the water a good month or two before I should.
It is better to be lost at sea than found on the couch.
Actually I think Twain’s words are good advice for looking forward. Clearly it’s better to do stuff than just dream about it.
But I think the prediction about future disappointment is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy that encourages you to dwell too much on the “things you didn’t do.” That is a recipe for a frustrated old age. There are so many things you didn’t do. I didn’t walk on the moon. I wasn’t a Beatle. I didn’t found Microsoft. So what? No point in thinking about all that stuff. Much better to count current blessings…
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