Back in 2003 I wrote a song titled, “That Could’ve Been Me.” It’s about how sometimes we compare our lives with others’ (or even with the life we had imagined for ourselves) and feel as though we somehow don’t measure up. We watch what other people are doing and say, “That could’ve been me if only I’d done this or not done that…” Or, from the famous line in the film, On the Waterfront, we say, “I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody…” We coulda, woulda, shoulda been better, done something, taken this path, made that decision…and because we didn’t we’re somehow not living the life we feel we should be living.
Tonight I am grateful for learning to live without regret. I say learning because I definitely haven’t arrived at a place where I have let go of all my coulda-woulda-shouldas and fully live the life that is in front of me. It remains true that tomorrow isn’t promised to us; that all we really have is today, this moment. It is a waste of precious time to regret what didn’t turn out the way we’d thought/hoped/planned or to fret about our thoughts/hopes/plans for the future. One is over, the other hasn’t gotten here yet, and still I live too much of my life in one or the other and not nearly enough in the here and now.
The other day I sat watching a procession of university faculty wearing academic regalia and walking in stately ceremony as part of a formal institutional celebration. As I watched I remembered marching in procession and wearing academic regalia and sitting on stage as a member of the university administration. I remember wishing I had made different decisions about the trajectory of my academic career. “If only I had done x, y, and z I would be a tenured professor now instead of an university administrator. How my life would have been different if I had taken this step instead of that one.” I had a moment of intense regret until I shook it off with the realization that I am where I am now and all the coulda-woulda-shouldas are completely irrelevant. It is incumbent upon me to be where I am now and be the best me I can be while I’m here.
Oh children listen to me as you stand at this crossroad, Deciding what you will carry along and those things you can offload. I hope you follow your heart, and listen hard to your own voice. In choosing where you will start as best that you can make it your own choice. You’ll be glad that you did it your way, You won’t want to wake up and say, “That could’ve been me.” So you say, “That could’ve been me instead I heeded my own voice.Walking the path of my true choice and living life the way I dreamed it could be. So now I lift up my hands and give thanks to the Creator of all things, Who put a song in my heart, gave me a new start and let me be me.
I am grateful for the reminder that I am where I am supposed to be for this time of my life. I may not always understand why I am where I am, but I take comfort from the line in the poem The Desiderata that says, “whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.” I am part of that great unfolding. I am looking forward to continuing to live into what that means.
(That Could’ve Been Me, words and music © Marquita T. Chamblee, 2003)
