[ReUpload] The Psychology of Regret: Why We Dwell on Past Mistakes

The Psychology of Regret: Memory, Morality, and the Impossibility of Letting Go

The Deeper Thinking Podcast

For those drawn to ethical memory, reflective depth, and the architecture of what-ifs.

What exactly is regret—and why does it linger? This episode rethinks regret not as failure, but as a signal: a moral memory, a call to presence, and a mirror of the lives we almost lived. From the structure of memory to existential ethics, we trace regret as a force that reshapes identity and binds us to the past. With insights from cognitive science, philosophy, and literature, we explore how regret endures, how it distorts, and how it teaches.

Drawing on thinkers like Daniel Kahneman, Bernard Williams, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Henri Bergson, this conversation unfolds across five lenses: cognitive patterns, ethical tension, memory distortion, cultural archetypes, and the question of whether letting go is even possible—or desirable.

Through stories, studies, and paradoxes, we ask: What if regret is not a flaw, but a form of wisdom we haven’t learned how to hold?

Reflections

Here are a few reflections that surfaced in the making of this episode:

• Regret is memory refusing to heal—not because we’re broken, but because we’re still listening.
• The past is not over. It’s embedded in the way we frame possibility.
• To regret is to feel the contour of an unlived path—and to mourn its silence.
• Some regrets are burdens. Others are teachers. We confuse the two at our peril.
• Regret doesn’t just haunt; it reveals what we value most deeply.
• Letting go may not mean forgetting. It may mean learning how to carry differently.
• Sometimes, we miss red the past not because we didn’t know better—but because knowing doesn’t always change feeling.

Why Listen?

• Explore how cognitive science explains the fixation on "what could have been"
• Engage with Jean-Paul Sartre and Bernard Williams on moral responsibility and regret
• Reflect on how Henri Bergson reframes time and memory in the presence of loss
• Consider whether letting go of regret is liberation—or a form of forgetting too much
• Discover how literature and cinema encode regret as a mythic structure of modern life

Listen On:

• YouTube
• Spotify
• Apple Podcasts

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Bibliography

• Williams, Bernard. Moral Luck.
• Sartre, Jean-Paul. Being and Nothingness; Existentialism is a Humanism.
• Nietzsche, Friedrich. The Gay Science; Twilight of the Idols.
• Bergson, Henri. Creative Evolution.
• Kahneman, Daniel. Thinking, Fast and Slow.
• Schacter, Daniel. The Seven Sins of Memory.
• Seligman, Martin. Learned Optimism.
• Neff, Kristin. Self-Compassion.
• Proust, Marcel. In Search of Lost Time.
• Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Crime and Punishment.
• McEwan, Ian. Atonement.
• Ishiguro, Kazuo. The Remains of the Day.

Bibliography Relevance

• Bernard Williams: Connects moral agency with the weight of hindsight.
• Jean-Paul Sartre: Frames regret as a confrontation with freedom and responsibility.
• Friedrich Nietzsche: Challenges regret through affirmation and recurrence.
• Henri Bergson: Explores how time folds through emotion and memory.
• Daniel Kahneman: Illuminates how regret distorts rational assessment.
• Kristin Neff: Offers psychological tools for meeting regret with kindness.

Perhaps the hardest part of regret isn’t the pain of what happened—but the silence of what never did.

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