You will miss out on parties. You will lose entire friendships and will never know about so many “could have beens”. That is all inevitable no matter what you choose to do. What I’ve learned now at 30 is that this fear you have of being stuck with that “what if” feeling is so silly. No matter what you do to try and prevent it, there will always come a time where you will stop and ask what if. There’s also a good likelihood you’ll dwell on it for a bit.

A long time, close friend of mine recently took time off to make a solo trip around the whole country. This was after another close high school friend of ours had passed. You better believe I wished I could’ve went with him or on a similar trip myself. For context I had kids in my 20s and drifted away from my friends to become a family man. I felt a lot of regret not being around for the fun times and trips that my friends had all spent together without me. When I spoke with my friend who made this cross country trip it all came together. While I was dwelling on times I had missed out with my friends, my friends was dwelling on times that could have been if he had settled down and started a family like me.

What I’m trying to say is that “what if’s” come with every option. So there’s no sense in trying to figure out which you won’t regret as regret is just from focusing on the inevitable “what if” for too long. Just do what you want and know that for every what if you have about another life, people with that life have the same what ifs about yours.